Not Exactly Dead
by SpicySalmon
Summary: What if instead of drowning, Corbett Stackhouse was turned by a snarky vampire who was hunting fairies? This story takes place shortly after the revelation and predates Vampire Bill trying to procure the telepath for QSA. Rated M for later chapters. E/S
1. Chapter 1

**What if instead of drowning, Corbett Stackhouse was turned into a vampire? What if Michelle Stackhouse was never in the car?**

**Rated M for later chapters.**

**A/N: My first fic, please be gentle. **

**Disclaimer: Charlaine Harris and Alan Ball owns them all.**

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Chapter 1

**1986**

**PPOV**

Fucking fairies. I couldn't believe I fell for Eric's shit. Again. And to think I actually flew commercial from Minnesota. I even spent the trip plotting how best to capture one without draining it so I could share with him. Sometimes I forgot just how much of a major dipstick my maker could be when he was bored. I should've known better than to think there'd be any fairies in this backwater town. Good Times my baroque print, Versace clad ass. The only thing that could've possibly made this night any worse was to see the smirk on Eric's smug face when I showed up with my black suede and rhinestone Stuart Weitzman pumps covered in mud. Which they were.

I looked down sadly at my now destroyed shoes and kicked them angrily into the woods before getting back into the station wagon to begin the drive back to Eric's in Shreveport. Distracted from rewinding the cassette tape back to the beginning of Cyndi Lauper's True Colors, I almost drove off the destroyed bridge. Quickly, I swerved to the left and missed going over by mere inches.

"This is so totally unfair!" I whined after realizing I'd have to run the rest of the way back to Eric's shoeless. The bridge was the only way out of Bon Temps.

With a sigh, I climbed out of the car. Morbid curiosity made me hesitate and look over the edge but fuck if I know what compelled me to dive into the water and pull the tiny human out of the car. After getting her safely on land, I performed CPR and, within minutes, she was coughing up water.

"Good, you're not dead." I said as I prepared to take off for my maker's. I did not want to stay and endure the human's grief and hysterics.

Instead of tears, she surprised me by staring wide eyed at me and rasping, "Please save my daddy too."

Now, contrary to what the evidence might say at this point in time, I did not make a habit out of rescuing breathers. I rarely looked twice at them, if at all. They were good for three things - feeding, fucking, and fashion. But there was just something about the little human that - Okay, fine, when I was rescuing the child, I glanced at the front seat and noticed the male that must have been her father. And he was wicked hot. Late twenties, early thirties. Gorgeous cheekbones and blonde hair that rivaled my maker's. And that bod.. Ooh that bod and with that tan.. I knew right then and there that if he was still alive, he'd be going back to Minnesota with me daughter be damned.

I pulled the driver's side door off it's hinges, hugged my arms around the unconscious human's waist, and propelled us upwards. It wasn't until we were back on land that I'd inadvertently taken my first breath since jumping into the water. A haze crept over my vision and my eyes glazed over. I quickly lost the battle for control over my mind and body with my instincts, and everything went blank.

By the time I realized what I was doing, I had already nearly drained the male fairy. Eric must have felt my euphoria because I sensed him getting closer through our maker-child bond. And now the tiny human, and I was certain she was human, was crying.

"Stop." I commanded.

She continued leaking.

I pushed more of my will into the command and tried again. "Do not cry. Everything's going to be alright. Your father's fine."

She perked up at the last bit. Tilting her head to the side, she rubbed her eyes and wiped her snot on the back of her hand.

"Daddy's not dead? But I can't hear him anymore", she said hoarsely.

Fuck, fuck, fuckaduck she couldn't be glamoured. I looked at the male fairy. I couldn't detect a pulse, but he also wasn't a pile of glittery mess. That could either mean he was still alive or that he was only a hybrid and truly dead. Seeing as how the midget could clearly pass for a human, and let's not forget my unbelievably bad luck tonight, the latter was most likely true.

I cleared my throat unnecessarily and hedged, "Maybe?"

Her lips quivered and her eyes filled with tears.

In the split second before she began leaking again, I quickly weighed my options: Eric would have a cow if I left a witness but he'd shit kittens if I drained a child, hybrid or not. With time running out before we were discovered, I did the only thing I could think of that would let me get off scot free with my maker.

I grabbed both father and daughter, and threw them back over the bridge.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: Wow, never in a million years did I expect the story to garner so many follows, reviews, and favorites already. Honest to God, I thought it would take at least five chapters before it even got one review. You guys are freaking awesome!**

**Shout outs to all my homefries who left a review: sluggysmom aka my first reviewer, VAlady, perfecta999, murgatroid-98, Lori p 100, racecz5, allison actually, majestic seahorse, Cotharach, Elsie, and Guest.**

**Thanks for giving me and this story a chance. It was really nerve wracking posting that first chapter but you guys gave me the confidence to keep going and I sincerely thank you all for being so kind and welcoming to a new writer in this wonderful fandom.**

**Disclaimer: Charlaine Harris is their maker.**

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Chapter 2

**1986**

**EPOV**

Sometimes I wondered where I went wrong with my progeny. I glamoured a history scholar well versed in Sun Tzu's teachings to explain The Art of War the night after she tried to attack a vampire six centuries _my_ senior. He was a marquis of sorts in his human life and walked around with a permanent stick up his ass. Pam, only a few years turned at the time, overheard him making quips about low born plunderers and leapt for his throat. She was lucky that he was an old friend of mine and was just testing her worth as my child. Although we all had a good laugh, her obvious lack of self preservation worried me. It didn't matter that she was being protective of me. There were better ways to do so without losing her head and, as her maker, it was my duty to help her see them. I trained her in ninjitsu when it became obvious she would always be too voracious a predator to survive hunting on her own. When I noticed that she'd always attack instinctively with her hands and fangs, I taught her how to effectively wield a broadsword to keep enemies with stakes at bay. Her entire existence revolved around training to survive in our tempestuous world and being spoiled by me to encourage her development. When I was finally satisfied with her progress, that she'd survive on her own if something were to happen to me, we set sail for the new world.

I'll admit I was strict with her during her first century, but it's the way of our kind. Those who were too lazy or stupid to improve themselves were at risk of exposing us all. They were usually purged before their first decade. Pam understood this. I made sure of it. It's why I had no one to blame, but myself, for her ruthlessness when I saw her throw a child into the river.

I pushed my body harder to catch the screaming child, though I knew the distance was too great. The piercing screams were abruptly cut off when her little body entered the water. Casting my child an exasperated look, I dove into the water after the girl.

The impact from diving in from such a high altitude cracked several of my vertebrae and took seconds to heal. By then, I had already spotted the girl and the accompanying adult only yards from her. Anger overcame me; the man was drained and had similar features to the girl. I never imagined I would feel the emotion towards my child, but after quickly piecing together what must have happened, I felt disappointment towards Pam. I was militant in her teachings, yes, but I never failed to show her affection. Quickly formulating the next step in her training, I grabbed the two humans and flew up to my willful child, spotting a submerged empty car only in passing.

I set them down carefully and detected traces of an enticing scent. It was fleeting and, instead of dwelling, I shored up my resolve to deal with my shamefaced child.

"Pamela, as your maker, I command you to turn the male." I saw her lips open, to make a protest no doubt, and held my hand up. "I don't care if he becomes another Bubba, you are to treat him and aid in his development and training, as I have you. Where I have failed as your maker in teaching you compassion and virtue, perhaps your child will succeed." I felt the command take hold and Pam disappeared into the woods with her future progeny in her arms.

I looked down at the girl. She was in shock but otherwise appeared no worse for the wear. The Great Revelation was only two decades away, but I couldn't risk having a child expose us prematurely. I debated on whether to let her remember the details of the night upon learning of our existence, but decided to spare her the horrors of witnessing the loss of a parent.

The weather was warm enough that she wouldn't freeze to death, so I picked her up and flew us down to the riverside. Satisfied that she'd be at a safe distance from the river, I bent down to place my face directly in front of hers and willed her to forget.

"You remember nothing after your car drove off of the collapsed bridge. You do not know how you made it to shore or what happened to your male relative. You will not remember me or the other vampire."

She blinked her big blue eyes twice and nodded slowly.

I stood up, brushed my hair out of my eyes, and took off for my nearest safe house. I thought I heard a whispered "thank you", but I knew it was just the wind.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

**2002**

**SPOV**

The phone rang just as I began washing the dishes from tonight's dinner.

"I'll get it, dear." Gran said, while putting the last of the leftovers away.

I tried not to eavesdrop. Really, I did, but it was hard not to when Gran was so excited about whatever Maxine Fortenberry was telling her.

"Oh my word! . . . And you're certain it wasn't one of those movie commercials? . . . Well I'll be damned! . . . She's talking to Barbara Walters? Right now? . . . Maxine, I'll have to call you back . . . Yes, yes, thank you. Goodbye now." Gran grabbed one of my soapy hands and started for the living room.

"Gran, slow down! Who's on 20/20?" I asked, while wiping my hands on the dish towel I snagged on my way out of the kitchen.

"A vampire, can you believe it?" She turned the knob for the right channel and seemed to be speaking to herself when she said, "I always wondered if there were others."

"Others?" I asked, while recalling what happened all those years ago. Did Gran meet them too? I didn't think so. For one, I would've caught a stray thought back when I didn't know how to shield very well. And for two, other than detecting the black hole that was the vampire who took my daddy around his house those first couple of nights, I hadn't seen hair nor hide from either of them again. Pamela was crazier than sprayed roach and I was scared to death of her coming back to kill me, or worse, Jason. But I kept my promise to Him and didn't breathe a word of what happened to anyone. There were times when I prayed for Him though. When things got real bad at home, I'd run down to the river and pray for that big ol' blonde vampire to come and save me. That never happened. Michelle only stopped when Sheriff Bud Dearborn came and arrested her, but by then, it was already too late. Jason had already taken off.

Gran sat down next to me on the couch and looked at me with a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes. "Yes, others, dear. You're a mind reader aren't you?" She patted my hand and turned towards the television. "Now hush, I want to hear what they're saying."

We watched, entranced, as the teenaged vampire shyly dropped her fangs on Barbara's command. Her name was Flora and she was fifty some odd years old. She suffered from a medical condition that made her deathly allergic to the sun and gave her an extremely restricted diet. A diet that she hated. In fact, she was even squeamish of it, and was very grateful to the Japanese scientists for inventing the synthetic blood that she now depended on to keep her alive.

Flora was very pretty and very petite. Light brown hair that looked soft and inviting, downcast eyes shaded by long brown lashes, delicate features that made her almost doll-like; she wasn't anyone's idea of a monster.

After the program ended, Gran and I looked at each in silence. Then, almost simultaneously, huge grins spread across our faces.

"How many vampires do you think they went through to find one that unthreatening?" I asked. I knew darn well what they were capable of and it sure ain't shit like what Flora was trying to sell us.

"Oh, I don't know if it's a bad thing that they're so cautious. They did manage to keep themselves a secret and safe for this long." Gran replied thoughtfully.

Like I did so many times before, I wondered if my daddy really became a vampire like He ordered. What all happened during a "turn"? If he did become one, what kind of vampire was he now? Nasty like that Pamela? No, I didn't think who you were as a human got erased. While I doubt He'd ever win Humanitarian of the Year, He did seem to retain some of his humanity. I mean yeah, He did sentence my daddy to an eternity of darkness but, was that really a fate worse than death? Would Gran still consider him her son and welcome him into her home?

"Gran?" I asked, hesitantly.

"Yes, dear, I'd rather have him right here by my side as a vampire than buried six feet underground." She replied, without a beat.

Sometimes I wondered if she could read minds like me but as soon as that thought entered my mind, I shook it out of my head. I wouldn't wish my disability on my worst enemy.

Gran stood up and began walking to her room. "A vampire who's squeamish of blood," she said while shaking her long white hair, "well, now I've truly seen it all."

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** A/N: Sorry this one was so short! I didn't want to start another scene on the same chapter and I wanted to slip certain details in before the big reunion so it wouldn't be weighed down by huge infodumps.**

**Thank you to everyone who read, reviewed, followed, and favorited this story!**


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: I'm sorry to disappoint but... Gran is _not_ a telepath. She's just a run of the mill species called the intuitive woman ;) **

**And to the guest reviewer who suggested it, sorry but this Sookie won't be shooting light out of her hands. I'm trying to follow canon as best as I can though I've never (and will never) read Deadlocked and DEA.**

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Chapter 4

**2002**

**CPOV**

I turned and studied the woman next to me. Pretty blonde hair worn loose around her shoulders. Eyebrows knitted in a frown. Big blue eyes staring down at the hands twisting on her lap. Pert little nose perched on top of those soft pink lips she'd been nibbling on since we got off the plane two nights ago. The woman could bring me to my knees with that sweet mouth of hers but also make me madder than a wet hen. But God, she was beautiful.

"Ain't gotta do this, babe. Lemme go'n explain what happened. Let 'em know I ain't exactly dead. You can meet 'em next time."

She turned those hopeful baby blues on me. As if I'd ever make her do anything that made her unhappy.

"I mean it." I leaned in to kiss those lips and whispered, "I'll meet you back in Shreveport."

I shut the door and slapped the hood twice before turning to stare at the house my ancestors built. Sixteen years. God, had it really been that long? Felt like only yesterday I dropped Jase off here with momma and left with my little Sookie for one of our Wednesday night dates. I glanced at the back door with a wistful sigh and walked up to the porch to knock on the front door. Things were different now.

"I'll get it!" I heard a woman shout. Then, bare feet slapping against wooden floor as she ran down from the second floor.

I must've been listening too intently to the going ons inside the house because I didn't even realize the car never left until I felt her slip her hand into mine.

She leaned her forehead into the crook of my neck and breathed, "I'll always be where you need me."

Fuck, but I loved her.

The footsteps reached the door, but instead of opening it, the female turned tail and ran towards the kitchen shouting, "Gran! Gran! Grab the shotgun and don't answer the door no matter what!"

Momma asked her what in the six shades of hell she was hollerin' about and the girl replied, "I promise I'll tell you everything later, but please, just trust me for now?"

I called out to the woman who I hadn't seen in too, too long, "Momma, it's me, Corbett!" But the banshee must've drowned my voice out with all her belligerent shouting about how some crazy bitch just couldn't stay away and how she knew this day would come.

I looked down at my companion, lover, maker, for the past sixteen years and wondered just what the fuck she did to strike such fear in that girl.

I listened dishearteningly as the female called a Mr. Merlotte and asked him what he'd do if a crazy, bloodthirsty vampire showed up at his door.

Deciding to just wait things out instead of causing even more panic, and truth be told I was enjoying the show, I chuckled as she shouted, "Oh, cut the shit -Ow, what was that for, Gran?!- Sam Merlotte, I don't have time for your stupid games right now! I know you're different same as I know how that goddamn -Ouch!- judgemental bitch -OW!- of a waitress of yours, Arlene what's her face, is pregnant again and that she ain't plannin' on tellin' anybody until she figures out who the daddy is!"

I heard a stifled giggle from below me and grinned. "Got a mouth on her that rivals yours, babe."

Pam shook her head and just laughed as my little girl chewed that Sam fella a new asshole.

"No, of course I don't have a goddamn -Ouch- stake! Do I look like one of those small minded, bigoted assholes -Ow! Gran!- who go to your bar?. . . Walmart?! But they only came out of the coffin last night! . . . Out of chair legs? I guess that'll have to do for now. . . No, that voodoo mind shi- crap doesn't work on me . . . Never mind how I know . . . Two, you think Bud can handle 'em? . . . Then which sheriff do you mean?"

"Uh oh," I chuckled, "Grandpa ain't gonna like that phone call one bit. Time to put an end to my baby girl's hollerin'."

Pam nipped my lip, and replied, "Eric hates it when you call him that."

I smiled. "Why else do you think I do it?"

Strolling to the back door, I knocked on the kitchen window and smiled as my momma and my beautiful baby girl wore identical open mouthed, dumbfounded expressions when they saw me.

"Y'all gon' stare at me all night or y'all gon' invite us in?" I asked, with a shit eating grin.

I watched, with amusement, as Sookie dazedly mumbled, "Later Sam, my daddy's home," and placed the phone back in its base. Then, as if her brain finally caught up with her, her face broke into the widest smile and she shouted, "My daddy's home!"

Momma, finally snapping out of her own shock, ran and threw open the back door. With tears running down her face that must've aged decades more than it ought to, she stared up at me and ordered, "Well, what are ya waiting for, boy? Get in here and give your momma a hug!"

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**A/N: So.. This Sookie has quite a mouth on her, doesn't she? She didn't have Gran's influence on her life until much later than canon Sookie.**

**Something completely random but soooo cool; Corbett means Raven. I checked a bunch of baby naming websites and they all said Corbett was either Latin, Old French, Old English, or something, for Raven. And for those who don't remember/know, Pam's full name in SVM is Pamela Ravenscroft. I was going to give Corbett a new name, as per vampire tradition pre Great Revelation, but thought it was just too perfect to mess with.**

**And I swear the big reunion is coming up next. It'll be in Sookie's POV because ultimately, this is her and Eric's story and getting her perspective will give you guys a lot of insight to her past.**

**Thank you to everyone who read, reviewed, followed, favorited. You guys rock my socks!**


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

**2002**

**SPOV**

I'm not proud to admit it, but the second I detected that crazy ass bitch's black hole of a mind at my door, I freaked. It never even crossed my mind that my daddy would be with her. The only thing I thought about was keeping me and Gran alive. So I called the only person I knew who might have a handle on how to deal with vampires; Sam Merlotte.

Everyone always said I was a difficult baby. That all I ever did was cry and scream. From what Jason told me, I would always put my hands on my head and say, "ouch". The thoughts of everyone around me bombarding my brain physically hurt, and it only got worse when I started school. As children all around the world instinctively do when they've been hurt, I told my momma. Not knowing any different, I'd thought everyone had my disability. Picture me surprised when Michelle called me a liar, said I made it all up for my daddy's attention. I stopped asking for help after that but when my crying wouldn't let up, and daddy started asking questions, she brought me to all sorts of doctors who put me on all kinds of medications. That didn't work as well as she'd hoped. The medicine kept me drugged up enough that my brain, and everyone's thoughts, were pretty much just mush. Kind of like being underwater and hearing people talk, only the voices were filtered through some sort of recorder that played things back in slow motion, so it wasn't too bad. Night time was a whole 'nother story. It was like my brain must've finally made sense of all the thoughts and secrets that people were too ashamed or afraid of to say out loud, because the nightmares I had were something awful. Daddy finally had enough and asked Michelle what was really going on since I was too scared to tell him myself. That was the first time I ever saw my daddy cuss out my momma. The next day, soon as he left for work, she bought herself a bottle of Old Crow and drank herself into a drunken stupor she didn't come out of until she almost got me and Jason killed driving drunk as a skunk two weeks later.

Daddy had her bags packed and out on the porch the day she got home from the hospital.

For the first time in my life, I was happy. And it lasted two blissful, carefree years. Instead of going to a school full of hyperactive kids whose thoughts were as loud as they were busy, daddy dropped me off at my kindhearted, tranquil grandmother's house where the only neighbor she had was a quiet old man on the other side of the cemetery. Gran homeschooled me and I learned more on that first day than an entire month at school. On Wednesday nights, since there weren't a lot of people out and about, daddy would drop Jason off with Gran and drive us out to the city where we'd play games guessing what people were thinking. It was exhausting those first couple of months, and I damn near lost my mind listening to all those thoughts but slowly, I began learning how to keep them in the background. Instead of dozens of voices shouting at me, they became a constant buzz; kind of like reading a book with the television on. After I got a handle on that, daddy began asking me to listen to one specific person at a time. I learned how to partition and shield thoughts on one of those Wednesdays and I also heard my first snarly mind. It wasn't until Sam Merlotte came to town and opened his restaurant that I found another one.

After daddy "died", Michelle came back to live with us. Gran put up a hell of a fight, but the judge said she was only our grandmother. I guess no one ever bothered telling him that an abusive drunk wasn't much of a mother. Michelle punished Gran by not letting us see her but we found ways around it. The only good that came out of it was Uncle Bartlett becoming persona non grata as well.

Growing up, between keeping tabs on Michelle during the day and making sure Pamela wasn't lurking in the shadows at night, I pretty much never stopped listening to my surroundings. Most of the time, I didn't even bother making sense of what people were thinking. But sometimes, like after I found a collie with the same snarly brain pattern as Sam Merlotte's in the woods around Gran's, I paid attention. I paid attention each and every time I went to work at his bar. I paid attention to each nasty thought he had about my body. And, I paid particular attention to how his brain became almost angry in their snarls right before a full moon which, funny enough, he never worked during. See, after watching the man who was your world get sucked dry and taken away by a beautiful monster, and getting beaten so badly you needed screws put into your body by the one person little girls were supposed to trust the most in the world, you learn damn well and early the only person you can really trust is yourself.

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Sam was surprisingly helpful. He said vampires could only enter a home when invited and that invitations could, and should, be rescinded once they left. He also said silver hurt the bejesus out of them and that sunlight, a stake (which could be yours for an affordable $4.99 at Walmart) through the heart, and beheading were sure fire ways to kill them for good. He also mentioned calling some sort of vampire sheriff, but honest to goodness, I couldn't remember what was said after that because I looked up and saw the man who was my entire world, staring right back at me through the kitchen window.

"Well, what are ya waiting for, boy? Get in here and give your momma a hug!"

My daddy threw his arms around Gran and lifted her off her feet, all the while peppering her tear streaked cheeks with kisses. When he finally cleared the doorway to come give me a hug, the physical manifestation of my childhood nightmares was staring right at me.

Without thinking, I grabbed the broom, broke off its handle, and leapt for the bitch who destroyed my life.

An arm wrapped around my stomach and daddy's soothing voice crooned, "Shh.. Easy, baby girl. Everything's alright now. Daddy's here now and I ain't ever leaving you again."

It wasn't until then that I realized I was screaming, shaking, and crying hysterically.

Gran stared the vampire, whose merciless act all those years ago ripped our family apart, right in the eyes and said, "Won't you please come in."

I felt betrayed. I felt wronged. I felt like my world was turned on its head. And I knew, just knew, that if I could just kill her, then everything would be fine again. But my daddy kept a vise like grip on me and I wasn't going anywhere he didn't want me to.

She had the galls to appear contrite as she slowly crossed the doorway and entered my home, my sanctuary, my shelter from the nightmare that was my childhood. "I'm sorry for-"

"Killing my father? Throwing us over the bridge? Being the reason why my mother beat the shit out of me and, and, touched my brother?" I heard a gasp at this, but too angry to care about who I was hurting, I dredged on. "Because sorry doesn't fucking cut it when you've singlehandedly destroyed the lives of everyone I've ever loved. Sorry doesn't fucking make up for seven years of eating, walking, sleeping, and breathing in pain. It doesn't make up for a man who will never know a lover's touch without remembering his own fucking mother doing the same. It won't make up for the countless number of nights my grandmother stayed up waiting for my, or my brother's, phone call telling her we were alright before she'd let herself sleep. And it sure as shit won't make up for the years we lost with our daddy and son. So fuck you and your fucking sorry. You can shove it in the hole your cold undead heart was supposed to be and get the fuck out of my life."

I don't know what I expected to happen but it definitely wasn't Gran leading Pamela, by the hand, to a chair and wiping the bloody tears off of her face with a dish towel. Sometimes, I swear, that woman was too tenderhearted for her own good.

"Corbett, let go of Sookie and come sit next to your friend here. Sookie's going to wash her face and come back when she's ready to greet her daddy, and his guest, like the proper Southern woman I raised her to be." Gran said, while pouring four glasses of sweet tea. I knew she heard Flora say that blood was her only diet, so she was more shaken than she let on.

Too afraid to see my daddy's reaction, and too ashamed of being such a careless and hurtful shit, I walked quickly to the bathroom with my head down, and locked myself behind the door. I plugged the sink and turned on the cold water, belatedly realizing my body was shaking. The second the sink was filled, I dunked my face in and screamed. I screamed for the childhood Jason and I lost. I screamed for my grandmother who buried the empty coffins of both her children; one because his body was never found, and the other because she felt so imprisoned in her dying, cancer stricken body that she asked for her ashes to be scattered so that she'd finally be free. After I was done, I counted to sixty and allowed myself exactly one minute to grieve. I pulled the topper, fixed my ponytail, and headed back to the kitchen.

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I sat in the only unoccupied chair and reached for a glass of sweet tea. I felt several pairs of eyes on me but I ignored them and focused on gulping down my drink.

When I was finally done with my glass, Gran pointed at Pamela and ordered, "Start talking."

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**A/N: I'm sorry I ended it on a cliffie but I was just so emotionally drained by that point that I really didn't have it in me to even think about how to fix the mess I wrote Pam into. The next chapter will continue in Sookie's POV but I have a feeling it'll be a short one.**

**I'd also like to apologize for not replying to everyone's reviews since chapter 3 (or was it 2?). I rarely have any free time, and whatever I do have I try to use to write. I'm sure you guys understand :)**


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

**2002**

**SPOV**

"Start talking."

Pamela's eyes were on the hands that she was wringing in front of her, but she didn't really seem to be seeing them. I lowered my shields and studied her mind. It was the same size and shape as it was all those years ago, but something was off. It wasn't any lighter because it was still the pitch black nothingness I remembered it being, but _something_ was different about it.

My scrutinization was halted when she seemed to have made up her mind. She shored up her shoulders, looked straight at Gran, and said, "I found your son-"

"I'm afraid I'm not the only one here who's owed this explanation," Gran interrupted. "You will include both Sookie and I in your recollection of the events please, Ms. Ravenscroft."

If I didn't know any better, I'd have sworn I heard a bite in the way my name was spoken, but I knew I was imagining things because Gran had the temperament of a saint. And other than cussing out her current guest, I'd done nothing to upset her.

Pamela arched one perfect eyebrow at Gran's interruption and said, "I was hunting fairies-"

Gran gasped and covered her mouth with her hand.

"What the fuck are you talking about?" I spat, "Are you being purposely cruel by making shit up or are you getting a kick out of dragging this out?"

Completely ignoring me, Pamela turned towards daddy, and said, "My patience is wearing thin."

He nodded once in acquiescence and looked at me. "Q&A after. Promise, baby girl."

I narrowed my eyes at him but kept my mouth shut. I was fuming inside that he became evil incarnate's bitch. What the hell happened to him?

"My maker informed me that two of the most deranged and vicious fairies were in his area, leaving trails of magically mutilated supe corpses faster than he could get rid of them. They needed to die, and fast. We were too close to the Great Revelation to let those incestuous little fucks ruin everything for us."

She made a disgusted face when she mentioned that lovely little tidbit about the incest. I tried to imagine Tinkerbell doing what she described and her story became that much more incredulous. And what the hell were soup corpses? Some kind of zombie mush? I made a mental note to ask about that later as well.

"I tracked them to your one horse town but lost them about five miles from the river. When I reached the collapsed bridge, I looked over and must have seen what I assumed were Neave and Lachlan because I jumped into the river but pulled you out instead." she shrugged at me.

Daddy gave her a look that said she was full of shit and I wondered just how much of her story she was embellishing.

"After you vomited the contents of your stomach, you begged and pleaded with me to save your father." That wasn't how I remembered it and I gave her a nasty look but she turned to look at Gran instead. "I fished your son out of the water and drained him. After I'd had my fill, I threw them both back into the river." She left out a whole chunk of story here. "My maker, the vampire who sired me, arrived in time to save your granddaughter and I was forced to turn your son."

I looked at Gran, expecting her to ask Pamela for the whole story because the one we were given had bigger holes than the Grand Canyon. She looked ashen instead. I immediately felt like the biggest shit. This was all too much for her to take. No mother wanted to relive their son's murder.

Daddy must've noticed too, because he got out of his chair and knelt down in front of her. "Ought to go lie down, momma. We'll visit tomorrow night, yeah?"

Gran stroked his face tenderly and, slowly, shook her head. White hair framing a face marked by far too much sorrow, she was the most beautiful woman I'd ever known.

"No," she sighed. "This family has been hurt by its own secrets long enough."

That's when I realized; I'd let her mourn for a son who was never truly dead. My God, what had I done? I was too busy keeping a promise I made, to someone I'd never meet again, to see how much my lie of omission would hurt my Gran. For the hundredth time that night, I felt like such a shit.

"Gran, I'm so sorry.. I didn't know if it actually worked, that daddy would really be a vampire. I didn't even know for sure if my mind wasn't just making it all up because I missed him. But I should've told you regardless instead of letting you think he was dead. I am such an inconsiderate, thoughtless, selfish-."

"Hush child, enough. That's all in the past. The only thing that matters now is we have him back. And we have Ms. Ravenscroft to thank for that."

I looked incredulously at my grandmother. She must've lost her mind when she found her son. Did she forget that he was _murdered _by the very same person she was so gratefully thanking?

"Now if you'll all humour an old woman and spare her a moment of your time... I have something that I need to get off my chest, and it's been a long time coming."

Daddy looked at her expectedly while I looked on in confusion. Gran kept secrets?

She held onto daddy's hands tightly, as if he'd slip away again if she released her hold. "Your daddy, Mitchell Stackhouse God bless his soul, was a wonderful husband and provider. I loved him dearly, but he couldn't give me the one thing I wanted more than anything in the world.." A queasy feeling stirred in the pit of my stomach. "I was out tending the yard one day when out came this beautiful creature from the woods. There was no question that he wasn't an ordinary human. I was immediately drawn to him. There was an ethereal quality to him that had me simply mesmerized, and quite simply, he shined as radiantly as the sun itself. He introduced himself as Fintan Brigant-"

If vampires could get sick, Pamela would've upchucked everything in her stomach at hearing that name. I made a note to repeat it as often, in her vicinity, as possible and wondered if my entire existence was somebody's idea of a sick joke. It became obvious at this point where Gran's story was headed and I just couldn't, for the life of me, ever see my Gran as an adulteress. She didn't have it in her to do something so.. So wrong!

I dipped into her mind for the first time since learning how to shield thoughts, and saw the creature who had enticed my grandmother to commit a sin. Her memories took on a veiled, almost like there was a layer of fog covering it, quality and that just wasn't normal. Details of old memories that people couldn't remember too well appeared almost staticky, but only the parts they had trouble recalling. Gran's entire perception of what happened that day was covered in a layer of fog. Almost like it was a dream.

An idea quickly began forming in my head, and I didn't like what I pieced together one bit.

"-said I was the most beautiful creature his eyes had ever beheld. Of course I turned all shades of red and didn't believe a word he said. I was covered in dirt and pulled weeds, afterall." Gran stared at daddy's hand. "We talked for hours, stopping only when Mitchell came home. He visited a handful of times after that, and, " Gran squeezed her eyes shut as her face took on a pained expression. "Through our affair, he gave me the greatest gifts of all..." Her eyes searched daddy's face. She must've found what she was looking for, because she relaxed noticeably, and continued, "You and your sister were so very, very beautiful. Fintan warned me that the fae allure was a double-edged sword. That with each admiring look and opened door, came the jealousy and the enemies. I was foolish to assume he meant human enemies. But I was wrong, wasn't I? Your human life was taken from you because your vampire found you as alluring as all those girls you ran around with before Michelle."

Daddy shook his head. "Momma, don't. We gettin' a fresh start now. No good in thinkin' on the past. Finish your story, Sookie's gotta list of questions a mile long."

Gran nodded and held his hand tighter. "My Mitchell told me kindly, years later, that he had mumps as a boy and was sterile. He never blamed me for my transgressions, and in fact, loved you and your sister like you were his own."

The secret must've been eating away at her for years. And I was all too certain she wasn't acting out of sound mind all those years ago.

I looked at Pamela. "You know something."

She nodded but didn't elaborate.

"Fintan Brigant," I said, and felt a jolt of satisfaction when she winced at the name. "Fintan Brigant was..." I paused, waiting for her to fill in the blank. After several beats of loaded silence, I tried again. "Fintan Brigant wasn't human... Fintan Bri-"

"Oh will you stop saying that name, for fucks sake! He's a fairy. A fae prince of the Brigant line. Son of the crowned prince, Niall Brigant. Father of, apparently, your father and dead aunt. Grandfather of-"

"Alright, alright, I get it. So, fairies... They're evil?"

She looked at me as if I was stupid. "Because the entirety of any one race can be conveniently put into a box that's labeled by something as profound as _your_ definition of one word."

I gritted my teeth. "In a general sense, are fairies malicious? Prone to acts of violence? Known to cause pain and suffering?"

She arched that goddamn eyebrow of hers and replied, "Some, yes."

"Cheese and rice! Is Fintan Brigant an evil bastard capable of rape?" I blurted, then immediately regretted it when Gran got up and left the table.

Surprisingly, Pamela actually waited until Gran was out of earshot before she replied softly, "If your grandmother was raped, she would have remembered it."

"You and that big blonde vampire tried to erase my memories. And before you try to deny it, I felt both of y'all poke my mind with that mind voodoo when y'all tried."

Daddy shook his head and took over. "Don't know much about 'em other than what I'd been told, but far as I know, the only glamour they can do is changing how others see them."

"Then why would Gran's memory of him be covered in a layer of fog?"

"Because he was protecting me." the woman in question replied as she walked back into the kitchen clutching an old photo album to her chest. "The fae allure is so magnificent that seeing one in their true form would drive a human mad. Consumed with nothing but thoughts of the fairy, the human would eventually wither away and die. Corbett was only a quarter fae but it seemed to be enough to affect Michelle."

The gravity of what she _didn't _say slapped me in the face. Was my grandmother somehow implying that my brother caused our mother to molest him? Simply by being born into this family? Did the same rules apply for what uncle Bartlett did to me, Hadley, and aunt Linda? Was it _our _fault, because we had the fae allure?

Horrified, I looked at Gran. "Uncle B-"

"No!" Gran shouted vehemently as she placed the album on the table and pulled me into a hug. "Don't you dare think what that monster did was your fault. You weren't the first, and you weren't the last. Bartlett was a sick man and I should've let Mitchell kill him when we found out what he did to Linda."

"My baby girl too?" Daddy whispered, his face twisted in anguish.

Before I could even formulate an answer, he was gone. Pamela cast one look at us, nodded that she'd look after daddy, then disappeared as well. If it weren't for the kitchen door swinging open and shut, I'd have thought they up and vanished into thin air.

* * *

**A/N: Rest assured, Sookie's beef with Pam is ****_far_**** from over. There's a lot of shit still left to clear up and I have a feeling that more than a few of you still wanna stake Pam (and maybe even Gran. Lotsa hate for the Stackhouse matriarch there floating on the review page lol but trust me, please. All will be explained. Just give me a chapter [or two.])**

**Pam's POV is coming up next.**

**As usual, thank you to everyone who read, reviewed, followed, and favorited. Seeing the love/hate/suggestions the story's receiving after each update really encourages me to keep going. When I used to read this in other people's A/N's I thought they were just hustling for reviews but, swear to God, it's the truth.**


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7

**2002**

**PPOV**

Fucking fairies. I should've went back to Shreveport to help Eric finalize the plans for our new bar instead of going to the ground zero of inbreeding.

First, I got insulted by the detestable spawn of a whore and fae. Her pathetic attempt at staking me wasn't even worth mentioning, but the sheer fact that someone, _anyone_, had the audacity to raise a stake to me and then lived to tell the tale..

And when she started leaking and shouting hysterically about how she and her brother were abused by their mother as children, I broke. I was unfamiliar and, therefore, uncomfortable with the emotions. Unnecessary feelings, ones that made vampires weak and consequently got us killed, were one of the first parts of our humanity we lost when turned. For some it took decades, for others years. It wasn't a conscious decision, though I'd never spoken to anyone other than Corbett who admitted to trying to hold onto them, it was just one of the by products of being a vampire. Like accelerated healing. My maker, after a thousand years, lost all of his superfluous emotions. All he had left were ghosts of what he should feel, and whatever slithered through our bond from Corbett. It wasn't much and, logically, he should be a murdering psychopathic bastard. But Eric was nothing if not stubborn, and he refused to succumb to the madness that had taken so many others of his years. He lived by his own interpretation of a moral code. Something he retained from his life as a Viking. And among others on the short list, he vowed never to kill children and mothers. I think it had more to do with his human wife and children than his life as a marauder, but he never offered, and I never asked. That code was what made him save Sookie, and I was almost certain it was the reason for my turning Corbett as well.

Or maybe my maker was psychic. Because when Sookie had diarrhea of the mouth and began spouting things of her past, Corbett was attacked with a torrent of unpleasant feelings. Shame. Regret. Guilt. Grief. Sadness. Despair. Pain. And through our maker-child bond, I experienced each and every loathsome emotion as well.

Then, after rendering me speechless with her hospitality, Corbett's mother annoyed the absolute fuck out of me with her interruptions and demands. And I slipped. I said the one thing Corbett asked me not to say. Based on my experience with the fairy hybrids I was acquainted with over the years, and I've known plenty, Corbett was at least a quarter fae. It was reasonable to assume his mother knew about his supernatural heritage, and he decided not to bring it up out of concern and respect for her. I obviously didn't give a shit about her sensibilities, but it was the only request Corbett asked of me. But I slipped. After she vexed me. And I regretted it almost immediately. Sex with someone you were bonded with was fucking amazing. Everything gets amplified, and climaxes could last forever when sent back and forth through the bond. But even sex couldn't completely make up for how irksome it was to receive all of the annoyingly depressing emotions a young vampire experienced. And that's exactly what I was bombarded with when "momma" turned white as a vampire after I mentioned fairies.

So, someone was going to die. It was the only thing that would've salvaged my night, and I was all too glad it was the vile creature that preyed on children. Eric would be proud, I thought with a fangy grin.

* * *

I followed Corbett to the Stoner Hill neighborhood in Shreveport. I knew what he wanted. I felt the thirst for retribution running through our bond and into my veins. It was a siren's call, the call for death, a song that I was all too familiar with and all too happy to answer. Unfortunately, now that vampires revealed ourselves, the possibility of the death being pinned on a vampire was too great to just barge in without a plan. Forensic science was a bitch and Eric would have my head if I fucked this up. Normally, I'd let my child take the lead so I could observe the progression of his training, but he was too close to bloodlust, and there were one too many variables than I was comfortable with. So I sent him calm and caution, and waited for the red haze to lift from his end of the bond. There was resistance at first, but slowly, he regained his composure and the berserker state he was so close to treading almost became an afterthought.

When he was ready, Corbett, still in his crouched stance in the shadows of the foliage, raised his head and surveyed his surroundings.

"Houses too close together."

I nodded. It was still too early in the night, some of the humans were still awake. And judging by the sounds coming from two of the houses, we'd have an extra two humans added to the population of Shreveport in ten months. Just what we fucking needed, more breathers.

"All it'd take is one biddy peeping through her blinds.."

To start a witch hunt, he didn't say. He didn't need to. I was all too familiar with them. My first decade as a vampire caused Eric nothing but trouble. I always said that it was a good thing vampires couldn't grey, otherwise I'd have given him a head full of white hair along with his wheat blonde ones. I didn't have the patience and never fully understood the anticipation and enjoyment of the hunt until I was much older than Corbett.

"Come back at two, yeah?"

I checked my watch. That was over three hours away, but it gave us close to four hours with him until we had to dispose of his body before dawn. Plenty of time to play.

I smiled in anticipation of the hunt. Corbett mirrored my smile, and it wasn't a pretty sight.

* * *

I never cared much for breathers. It's a universally known fact. So when my maker felt how anxious I was about "meeting the parents", he became so amused that he spent the two nights Corbett and I had been back dropping glaringly obvious hints for an invitation to the reunion. Neither of us wanted to give Eric any more ammunition to use against us than he already had, so Corbett did what he always did around Eric, he played dumb. As in, mentally and socially retarded. And as it always did when employed, it worked like a charm. I also walked away with a new handbag and of course, a matching puppy, courtesy of my guilt ridden maker and his American Express.

What started as a joke thirteen years ago quickly turned into what Corbett coined Maker's Guilt, which I may or may not have been known to abuse every so often.

After being forced to sire a vampire I did not want, I ignored my maker for two years. I was too young, not even two centuries undead, and much too beautiful to be a maker. Training a newborn was dirty work. It entailed months of going to ground in the wilderness, hunting whatever humans unlucky enough to venture into the woods (which ironically, became more and more frequent as modern housing became more and more luxurious. I never understood the concept of camping. If humans wanted an authentic experience, why sleep in tents and eat prepared food out of tins? Their social behaviors baffled me, but that was nothing new), learning how to subsist on infrequent feedings, and generally just learning how to survive in the likely event of vampires becoming the hunted. With the Great Revelation being less than two decades away, learning how to survive in times of war was crucial. Humans were just too fickle to expect perpetual peace, even if their initial response towards vampires were positive. Jealousy and fear were powerful motivators for prejudice and violence. That said, I wasn't prepared to have to share my existence with another. I didn't want to be weighed down by the responsibility. And being a good sire was extremely time consuming - something that I had an abundance of, but wasn't willing to spare. Unfortunately, you couldn't just make a vampire and walk away. Not even the dregs of our society did that. The maker-child bond was that compelling. It had to be. Our race, as self-serving and self-aggrandizing as we were, would never have survived otherwise.

Corbett and I left Louisiana the night he rose as a vampire. Our laws, and common sense, made it impossible for a new vampire to reside in his home state for the first years of his new life. Risk of exposure was too great. Corbett didn't meet Eric, as busy as he was, until almost a year after our cold war was over. By then, I had already informed my child of everything that happened the night of his turning. Including my throwing his precious Sookie over the bridge, which he did not take very well, and Eric's quip about him rising as another Bubba ("I don't care if he becomes another Bubba, you are to treat him blah blah blah"), which he thought was absolutely hilarious after I explained who Bubba actually was. So when Eric finally had the time, and royal clearance, to visit us in Minnesota, Corbett took it upon himself to become the world's first redneck vampire, and official bane of my maker's existence.

He insisted on calling Eric "grand pappy", exaggerated his already atrocious accent, and had a stockpile of the most revolting southern colloquialisms on earth.

He's so full'a shit, his eyes are brown.

I wouldn't spit in his ass if his guts were on fire.

He'd eat the corn outta her shit if she asked him to.

He wouldn't say shit if his mouth was full.

Eric was in his own personal hell. And I loved every second of it. The only caveat? I got shat on constantly for fucking a moron, but it was worth it. He'd feel guilty immediately afterwards for dooming me to an eternity with said moron, and I'd walk away with something shiny and new. I doubted the joke would last much longer though. After all, it only lasted as long as it did due to the amount of time they actually got to interact. Which was once or twice per year. Now that Corbett and I were moving to Louisiana permanently, well, I'd have to milk Eric for as much Maker's Guilt as I could before the gig was up.

"He's as windy as a sack full'a farts."

Eric looked up from the papers he was going over on his desk. Fangtasia - The Bar With a Bite, was in its final stages of completion. It was a guaranteed moneymaker, not to mention the accessibility to an easy feed and fuck for the vampires in our area would also mean less work and cleanup for Eric in the long run.

Exasperation written all over his normally inscrutable face, he asked, "What the fuck does that even mean?"

"He ain't 'lible." Corbett replied, distractedly. He was eyeing the bottle of True Blood in front of him suspiciously.

The frustration pouring from Eric into my side of our bond almost cracked me. I had to bite down hard on my cheeks to keep my amusement suppressed.

"Liable for what?" Eric asked while rubbing his temples. How Corbett was able to give a vampire a headache was anyone's guess, but Eric was close to losing it, so I sent caution to Corbett.

"'Lible a tellin' the truth! Nuts on a cracker, why's it always so goddang hard talkin' wit cha? I got fucked harder than a hooker on Nickel Tuesdays. Errthang he told me, all 'em monthly reports and updates, they were all shiet. My wife dang near beat my baby girl to death and touched my boy in ways a mother never ought to. And that fucker, Burnham Sr., why he's 'bout as useful as tits on a duck and I betcha anything, he kept all the money he was 'sposed to be givin' my momma too. I got half a mind to hunt Michelle and Senior down tonight, but me and sweet cheeks here already got plans wit the grim reaper. Speakin'a which, I ought to get errthang ready. I sure would hate to stop in the middle'a guttin' the fucker 'cause I forgot to pack somethin'." Corbett stood, "Scuse me."

Eric waited for the door to close before raising an eyebrow at me.

I took a sip of the synthetic blood we were all expected to drink in public from now on. It was revolting. "Apparently his wife wasn't the only one in the family with inbreeding on her mind. We're taking care of dear old Uncle Bartlett in a bit. And who will you be doing tonight?" I added, changing the subject. The less he knew about Corbett's family, the better. I knew it was irrational, I mean it was _Eric_, but I'd had a fiercely powerful desire.. No, it was a _need, _an innate sense of _need_ to keep my child safe since the moment he rose. And that included keeping his heritage, and what his precious little Sookie could do - unglamourable and a seer, from my own maker.

He shook his head. "Long Shadow wants to see the bar. Then I'll be dealing with five new check-ins. Thalia is also relocating to my area."

"Which state did she get kicked out of this time?" I asked, while examining my nails. I needed to invest in a better topcoat, my polish was already chipping after only two nights.

"Illinois. She was too... aggressive after the Great Revelation."

"After? It's only been two nights. Eric, you know I'd never question your edict but do you think it wise to have a rabid pitbull chained to your backyard?"

"When surrounded by snakes, what better pet to have chained than a pitbull?"

I looked up at that. "You anticipate trouble?"

"Always."

I nodded and resumed my appraisal of my nails. Maybe I should just get a manicure.

* * *

**A/N: do you guys want Bartlett's death "onscreen", or can we just accept that he was tortured and murdered and dumped somewhere as gator food? If you want the death, I'll write a short chapter and include it within the next day or two. If not, we'll be jumping about a year into the future because there's just too much political shit going on 2 days post GR to weigh down the story.**


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8

**2004**

**SPOV**

I'd been waiting for the vampire for hours when he finally walked into the bar.

Blonde hair a shade darker than mine, blue eyes that were twinkling in mischief, a handsome face that would look thirty years old forever. I wondered what kind of trouble my daddy got into this time.

He sauntered over to my section and kissed the top of my head before announcing, "O positive tonight."

"O positive? I thought those tasted like shit." I said, balancing a tray full of beer.

"Usually do, but I've been feeding on nothing but AB neg donors at Fangtasia all week." Daddy grabbed the tray from me before I could protest, and shouted, "Who ordered the Bud?"

"Right here, Mr. S!" Hoyt Fortenberry hollered back.

Hoyt was standing next to some other guys from the road crew, and they were all gathered around a pool table. My daddy delivered their beer and gave Hoyt and Catfish Hennessy one of those man hugs that started as a handshake and ended in a slap on the back.

"Now don't go huggin' every vampire you see, I'll get jealous." Daddy quipped, but there was an undeniable edge of caution in his voice.

He was warning them. Vampires hated unnecessary physical contact. It had something to do with their freakishly strong olfactory senses and their general disdain for humans. Thankfully, my dad was still too young to have lost his human mannerisms. I hoped I'd never have to see him all cold and emotionless like Pam was two years ago. She was still aloof most of the time, but at least she wasn't at the frigid ice queen level anymore. It was impossible to stay detached around Gran. That woman could thaw an iceberg with her hugs and kindness.

I left them to their guy bonding and checked on the other tables. As I was heating up the Tru Blood, something I _heard_ niggled at the back of my mind. I never had my shields completely up unless I was with Gran, but that didn't mean I understood everything I picked up though. I heard thoughts as background noise, and once in a while a word would jump out at me. It was difficult placing that singular thought to a person because of how faint the voice I heard was. So I dropped my shields, the fortress around my mind that I'd built to keep me sane, and drifted through thought after boring thought.

**...fries are so good, I should've ordered a large.**

**Five bucks ought to be enough to cover...**

**...shoot blanks now that he's a vampire? **

Eww! I did _not _need to hear that!

**...date with Arlene tomorrow night.**

**...wrong to ask Sookie out. Jason would've killed me for even considering it. **

A sharp pang shot through my heart. Not a week went by where I didn't think about him. None of the private investigators that Daddy hired over the two years that he'd been back had found him. A part of me kept saying he must be dead since he hadn't contacted us in almost ten years. And every time she opened her dumb mouth, I'd stuff an imaginary sock in it and duct tape it shut. My brother was alive somewhere. I knew it.

The PIs found Hadley though. Last I heard, she was living in Red Ditch with a husband and a kid. She never bothered to visit even though we were only about an hour and a half away. Hell, she didn't even bother inviting any of us to her wedding or baby shower. But that's typical Hadley. She only came calling when she was in trouble and needed money. The second it was all blue skies and sunny days, she forgot we even existed. I never cared for her selfish ass and never let her bother me. But Gran wasn't like me and she was heartbroken when Hadley started screening her calls. I could've killed Hadley for that. Pam actually offered after she saw how upset Gran was, but Daddy put a stop to that real quick. He said she "might be a bitch, but she's still a part of my baby sister" and to leave her be.

They also found Michelle. To the surprise of no one, she was in the only women's prison in Louisiana. I knew Daddy and Pam called in some favors and visited her one night a little over a year ago, but that was all either of them would tell me. My dad was a good man through and through. He might've been a vampire now but, at his core, he was still Corbett Stackhouse. And Corbett Stackhouse would never raise a hand to the mother of his children, no matter how much she had it coming. Pam and I weren't, and would never be, the best of friends, but we had something huge in common. We both loved Daddy something fierce. She would never admit it, and probably didn't even realize she was capable of it, but it was obvious to anyone who spent any amount of time with the two of them. And that was good enough for me.

To be fair though, I had to admit I was reticent about accepting her into our lives until Daddy had the "never bleed around a vampire" talk with me. Apparently, fairy blood to vampires was like water to a man stranded on a desert for days under the beating sun with no water or shelter for relief. It really put things into perspective and gave me a better understanding of that night. I was still miffed at being sacrificed to the river gods but that was explained as well. Daddy compared it to a junky being high as a kite being pulled over with a baggy full of coke. Their only options before the cop walked up to their window were to hide it, get rid of it, or swallow it. She couldn't very well hide an unglamourable seven year old with the corpse of her father, and she was in the mess she was already in because of the third option. That didn't go over very well with me but after a while, I stopped hating her. And she grew on me. Like a fungus. And Pam was, well, Pam. She was still as egotistical, self-centered, vain, and unfeeling as I remembered, but she was also a vampire. And what so many people often forget is that vampires are _not_ human and, therefor, should never be held up to the same standards or expectations as one. Because otherwise, they'd be sorely disappointed.

The fairy blood talk with my dad also made me paranoid as fuck about being out at night while on my period. I also avoided Pam like the plague during that week because underneath all that pink and lavender, was still the scary bitch I met all those years ago. So it was a good thing Pam went with him to confront Michelle, and I told her so by tracking down a seller of vintage Louis Vuitton trunks. I didn't have the money to buy her anything from the collection other than a luggage tag, but she was more than happy with it and the collector's contact information.

Even though I'd yet to meet her maker again, I knew from her stories that He'd somehow end up footing the bill. I smiled at that thought as I brought a Tru Blood over to my dad. When I turned to grab a pitcher of beer for one of my tables, he draped an arm over my shoulders and whispered against the top of my head, "So fucking glad to be back. Love you, baby girl."

An enormous smile spread across my face as I turned to stare up at my dad. "I know, and I love you too."

Then, with a kiss on his eternally stubby cheek, I skipped over to the bar where my boss, Sam Merlotte, was shooting disapproving looks at me. I was in too good a mood to let his sour disposition ruin my night, so I blew him a kiss and started humming Toxic, the new Britney song.

* * *

As the night progressed, I noticed the new guy on the road crew, Rene something or another, stealing glances at me as I flitted across the restaurant with everyone's orders. It didn't go unnoticed by Daddy who, from the corner of my eye, I saw step up to Rene.

Every. Fucking. Time.

I sucked on my teeth and dipped into Rene's head to watch the scene unfold. I knew better than to confront Daddy in the middle of a pissing match. Vampires were extremely territorial and over protective. To butt in right now would cause him to lose face, and that was a big no-no in their world.

"Boy, you ought to keep your eyes elsewhere if you know what's good for you." Daddy growled.

Rene held both his hands out in supplication. "I don't mean to make me the misère. Ain't know she your girl, for true."

Daddy narrowed his eyes and studied him. He must've sensed sincerity, fear, or who knows what, but he nodded once and returned to his chat with Catfish. After a few minutes, I caught his eye and gestured for him to join me by the back.

* * *

"You can't keep coming into my workplace and threatening to kill every guy who looks at me!" I whisper yelled.

"And why the hell not?"

"Because," I whispered furiously, "I'll get fired!"

He shrugged. "Sounds like a win-win. Hate that you're serving these assholes. Never lifted a goddamn finger to help you or Jase."

I wanted to bang my head against the wall. "That's because nobody knew about it! It wasn't any of their business!"

Daddy looked down and seemed to be studying his shoes. When he lifted his eyes again, they were rimmed in red. "Tryin'a look out for you now that I'm able. Can't know how sorry I am, not being there when y'all needed me."

And just like that, my anger deflated in a puff.

I wrapped my arms around my dad and breathed him in. Underneath the stale smell of vampire, I could still detect his woodsy scent. It brought me comfort when I was a terrified little girl hiding from the world, and it brought me comfort now.

"I get it, I really do. But if nothing else, you should at least trust that I'm more than capable of watching out for myself..." The guilt was killing me, but I stood my ground and continued, "Dad, I love you, but I don't think you should visit me at work if you won't be able to keep a lid on your temper."

And I meant it. Not only was his aggression scaring off Merlotte's customers and pissing off my boss, his behavior was off putting to some of the regulars and making people more prejudiced against vampires. I was also twenty-four years old and didn't need anyone defending my honor. It was archaic and kind of insulting.

"Ain't gon' stop coming round here just 'cause you're working, but I'll stop coming purposely during your shifts."

That was all I was going to get, but it was fair, so I nodded against his shoulder and relaxed.

A stray thought drifted to my attention.

**Zeerahb fanger bangin' bonne a rienne **

The thought disappeared as quickly as it arrived and I couldn't follow its owner. Weird. I looked over Daddy's shoulder but didn't see anyone either.

* * *

**A/N: so.. The muse is back! Hopefully she'll stay and I'll get to keep this 24hours an update thing going. I've already started chapter 9, so that should be up by tomorrow or the day after.**

**Majority of the reviews were against Bartlett's death, but VALady's words of wisdom, "Bartlett doesn't deserve the words on the page" really resonated with me. So, no torture scene! Sorry to the readers who actually wanted it. **

**Thank you for reading, reviewing, subscribing to, favoriting, this story. **


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9

**2004**

**SPOV**

I woke with a start. My Gran was dying. She was screaming inside her head for help, someone was trying to kill her. I opened my shields and almost threw up from what I saw. Women, at least half a dozen; beaten, raped, and strangled. He was going to kill my Gran, and I was next.

I slammed down my shields, jumped out of bed, and ran for her room.

A figure, a man, was sitting on her chest and strangling her with some type of cord. Gran was fighting him furiously, clawing at his arms and kicking, but he was too strong. Driven by some kind of madness, he was whispering to her and crying. I didn't have time to make out his words because I grabbed the lamp on her nightstand and swung it with all my might across the back of his head. The lamp broke but it didn't seem to faze him. His head snapped around and tear filled, crazy eyes stared at me. I spared a glance at Gran, noted that she was still conscious, and took off running for the coat closet by the front door. Gran kept Daddy's old rifle there, I just hoped I could reach it in time.

I heard him yell, "Let go of me, you crazy bitch!" but I kept running. Gran was buying me precious time with her own life.

I heard a loud, sickening crack just as I yanked open the closet door. I tried not to think about what might have caused the sound and focused on grabbing the rifle and cocking it.

I turned just in time to see the new guy from the road crew, Rene, round the corner. And I fired. I didn't have the time, nor was I in the right state of mind, to aim so it was a good thing the shot hit him in the middle of his neck because there was only one shot left in the gun. Blood sprayed everywhere and he went down in a thump. I ran, leaping over his body, back to Gran's room.

I found her in a heap on the floor. Her beautiful white hair was now blood red from the injuries she sustained on her head. Her left eye was swollen shut, her nose was broken, and her neck had a noticeable ligature mark. I wanted to shoot him again.

Hands shaking, I reached down to see if she was still breathing. It was shallow, but it was there. I cried in relief and ran to the kitchen for the phone. My finger reached for the 9, but I remembered something Daddy told me in passing after I burned my hand on the grill at work. "One drop will fix you right up."

The nearest hospital was over an hour away. I shook my head, we didn't have that long. I dialed Daddy and Pam's house, but no one answered. I tried his cell phone; it went straight to voicemail. I flipped through Gran's little spiral notebook and found Pam's cell phone number. Crossing my fingers, I punched in the number and waited. It rang about a thousand times before I was prompted to leave a brief message. I was about to give up and drive Gran to the hospital when I remembered they might be at Fangtasia. Thankfully, Gran had written that number down as well.

"Fangtasia, the bar with a bite!" A woman answered.

"Is-" my voice was hoarse from screaming. I cleared my throat and tried again, "Is Corbett or Pam there? This is an emergency."

"Nope, Master Corbett and Mistress Pam aren't in yet. Try again in a few hours, have a good night!"

"W-wait! Is Eric there?" I asked hurriedly. Please say yes, please say yes.

At the mention of Him, the woman over the phone turned hostile. "Who's calling? Master Eric doesn't speak to just anyone."

"Tell him- tell him it's Corbett's daughter and it's a life or death situation, please!"

Suddenly, Barry White began crooning through the speaker about how he couldn't get enough of my love, babe. I was put on hold. For some reason, I found that absolutely hilarious and began laughing uncontrollably. Even in my current state of mind, or maybe it was precisely because I was such a big bag of nerves, I thought about how rude the woman was being. You _always_ told the person to 'please hold' before you actually did it. God, was I shaking? I lifted my hand to my face. Either Louisiana was having an earthquake or I was shaking like a tickled Elmo.

"This is Eric."

And just like that, Louisiana stood still.

"Hi, I know you probably don't remember me, but you saved me about seventeen years ago from drowning in a river. A man, a serial killer, broke into my home tonight and he tried to-" I took a deep breath. "I think my Gran's dying and I was hoping you could find my dad. Or his maker, Pam." God, was I rambling? I looked at my hands but they were blurry. I rubbed my eyes. Oh, I was crying. At least I stopped shaking.

Silence.

"My dad's Corbett Stackhouse. Your grandchild." Was that the right terminology? "Or something," I added.

I heard a phone ringing on the other end of the line. He answered and said something too fast for me to discern. That didn't matter though, I was pretty sure it was spoken in another language.

"Where is the man now?"

It took me a second to realize he was speaking to me. "D-d-dead. I shot him in the neck."

Pause.

"They will be there shortly."

Click.

Too relieved to feel peeved at being hung up on, I placed the phone back in its cradle and rushed back to Gran. I sank down to my knees and cradled her head in my lap. Gently wiping the blood from her face, I began humming a song she used to sing to me when she'd put me down for my afternoon naps. I don't know how long I sat there, but the next thing I knew, Daddy was kneeling next to me and feeding Gran blood from his wrist. A pair of delicate arms wrapped around me and I turned to sob violently on Pam's shoulder. She ran her fingers through my hair in a trance-like state and belatedly, I realized she was crying too.

We sat there, the three of us, in our own thoughts and misery for what seemed like forever. I didn't know what was going on so I took my cues from the two of them and waited.

Pam broke the silence by saying, "Let me."

Daddy looked relieved and nodded.

She moved from around me and knelt by Gran's head. With a snick, her fangs descended and she bit into her own wrist. Quickly, she moved it to Gran's lips and I watched as her blood dripped into my grandmother's mouth.

We waited again until the blood began to work its way through her system. It was a long while before she took a noticeably large breath. Her eyes and nose were the first to show visible signs of improvement. The bones on her nose seemed to reform and realign itself, and the swelling on her eye went through several different stages and shades of bruising before it settled into her normal skin tone. Same went for the swelling on her cheek. Then the marks on her neck faded and the cut on her cheekbone healed. But she was still unconscious.

I looked at my dad and whispered, "Is she still human?"

It was Pam who answered, "It takes more than that to become a vampire."

I nodded. I didn't think Gran wanted to be one at her age.

Daddy moved to stand with Gran in his arms. Pam helped me up as well, and the two of us sat on the settee by the bed.

Daddy placed Gran carefully on her bed and disappeared into the bathroom. He reappeared with a wash cloth and began cleaning the blood out of her hair. It was a fool's errand. There was no way all that blood was coming out without a wash. Even then, her white locks might be tinted red for a long while. But I kept my mouth shut and watched. Daddy seemed to be doing it just to keep himself busy and I knew it was also reassurance that she was still here.

It was on Daddy's eighth trip to the bathroom sink when Gran stirred. We all gathered around her and waited. Her eyes opened slowly and she took in her surroundings.

She touched her neck and chuckled, "I didn't sprout an extra head, so why are y'all just staring at me?"

Daddy climbed onto the bed and drew her into a hug. "Never do that again, momma."

I slid in on the other side of Gran and hugged her side. "How are you feeling?"

"Like I could win a triathlon." She smiled.

I looked over at Pam who was standing self consciously by herself, and reached for her arm. I gave it a slight tug and she awkwardly joined us on the bed. The four of us were chatting- it was mostly Gran rehashing what happened, and the three of us mother henning her, when Pam suddenly stiffened. Without a word, she stood up and zipped out of the room.

Then, a door slammed shut. I looked at my dad; he was oblivious to everything other than the woman lying in bed.

I lowered my shields and searched for Pam's dark mind. She was by the woods outback but I felt another black hole, a much larger void, approaching from above with tremendous speed.

My heart beat a staccato rhythm as I slowly made my way to the kitchen. I watched through the windows as He landed just feet away from Pam.

I couldn't make out what they were saying but, to me, it seemed as if Pam was stalling. Her posture and body language screamed, "stay away", and I wondered why.

As if sensing me, he raised his eyes and looked directly at me. For reasons unbeknownst to me, my stupid hand lifted on its own accord and waved. He cocked an eyebrow and smirked, and I swear I heard Pam groan before her shoulders slumped in defeat.

"Sookie, invite him in, please." She said, right next to my ear.

I jumped. Even after two years, I was still unused to their super speed and stealth.

I walked over to the door where he was already waiting, and said, "Eric, won't you please come in."

He crossed the threshold, sniffed the air, and observed, "Aren't you sweet."

"Not especially," I replied.

He paused and studied me for a moment before laughing.

"Yo, you buggin? There's a dead dude in her hallway! Now is definitely not the time to be macking on the shorty, na mean?" Pam interrupted.

I felt properly chastised. My grandmother was in the other room, healing from a life threatening experience, and here I was, staring at back of the best looking pair of jeans in the history of asses- I meant jeans.

I was also confused as hell. Since when did Pam talk like that?

Eric froze midstep and turned his head to stare at his pint sized child. She wasn't exactly short, maybe three inches or so shorter than my five-seven, but He dwarfed everyone in comparison.

"What. did. I. say. about. BET?"

"That it's whack. I know you're just frontin', I caught you tapping your foot to some Snoop and Pharrell the other night."

He didn't deny it. Instead he arched a brow, and said, "As your maker, I com-"

Pam tackled him and slapped her hand over his mouth. "Don't you dare! I'm already forbidden from watching America's Next Top Model and The Simple Life, you are not taking away my Ursher and CiCi either!"

Eric swung her flat on her back on the floor and laughed. "That's because you were close to draining those vapid excuses for women."

"I _threatened_ to drain them. After I lured them here and fucked them first, of course. There's a difference between threatening to and actually doing. Namely, intent." She completed that statement by crossing her arms underneath her head and very maturely, sticking out her tongue.

That's when I realized; Pam was a brat. And not just any ol' brat either. She was a brat of epic proportions, but only around her maker. They seemed more like siblings to me than father and daughter and whatever she and my dad were. This was an interesting side to her that I never would've guessed she was capable of having. I suddenly felt like I was allowed into a secret club of sorts. Was this her way of saying, "welcome to the family?"

Eric shook his head. "I do not envy the media shitstorm that descended upon Nevada and California Los Angeles after Tupac and Biggie's deaths. Sophie-Ann would stake you herself if you were to drain a rapper in her area."

And Eric was humoring her. Like a child. Or was he serious? With Pam, you never really knew what to expect and to be honest, draining someone because she didn't like their music seemed within her logical realm of possibilities.

"Now, tell me, why have you not yet disposed of the body?"

She stood up slowly and patted herself for nonexistent dust. Gran and I kept a very clean house, and I was a little offended by her gesture. "Because Sookie heard that he had done this before. Successfully, of course. There were at least six of them, all fang bangers. Raped, mutilated, strangled. Sometimes not in that order."

"And he told her this himself?" He asked Pam.

"_She _is right here, and no he didn't. I saw it all in his head."

Eric looked at me, _really_ looked at me. "A seer?"

Pam looked panicked. Eric swung his head around at her. Was my disability supposed to be kept a secret? Well, someone should have warned me years ago because the whole town knew by the time I was sixteen and kneed my Gym teacher in the nuts.

"Seer as in 'Neo, you are the chosen one' or 'I see dead people'? Because I'll tell ya now, the second that fucker's ghost crawls under my blanket, I'm outta here."

"Telepath," Pam replied, completely ignoring me.

Instead of questioning my sanity or testing me, as was the norm, Eric surprised me by stating, "You are calling the human authorities."

"Yes," she answered, even though it wasn't a question. "The Stackhouse women want to get justice on behalf of the murdered women."

"How.. Noble," He might as well have had called us stupid by the way he said that word. "How do you propose to play this?"

Because Gran was completely healed and I was healthy as a horse, yet there was a supposed serial killer lying dead in our hallway with a bullet in his neck.

"Y'all could strangle me a bit with a cord and I'll say he attacked me."

Pam was considering it when Daddy appeared out of nowhere and said, "No."

"Glamour the sheriffs that show up into thinking I'm injured?"

"We'd have to glamour every dang person in this town. Second news spreads, they'll be lined up at the front door with casseroles for gossip." Daddy said.

"Bribe the local sheriff to corroborate the events of the attack." Eric suggested.

"No, can do. What Bud lacks in efficiency, he makes up for in honor." Daddy replied.

"Bribe the sheriff to corroborate the events of the attack, then have your mother and daughter relocate under the guise of safety."

"Momma'd never leave her ancestral home."

"Burn the whole fucking town down and kill every single one of these inbred morons."

That one was from Pam, obviously.

I ignored them all and walked towards the front of the house where Rene was still lying in a puddle of his own blood. I eyed his corpse warily as I squatted next to him. His upper body was covered in blood and his right hand was soaked from a last ditch effort of keeping the wound closed on his neck. My stomach lurched as I lifted his clammy left hand and yanked a chunk of my hair out with it.

Ouch! That hurt like a mother fucker!

"The fuck you doing?"

I looked up and saw all three vampires staring at me with varying levels of befuddlement and amusement.

"Evidence," I replied.

Pam cocked her head to the side and studied me. "You don't have sex, you don't do drugs, and the only alcohol you touch is rubbing. Then, all in one night, you kill a man, invite an unfamiliar vampire into your home, and tamper with federal evidence. Sookie Stackhouse, are you trying to impress me?"

"Federal?" I asked, confused. The logical part of me knew I should've been curled up in a ball somewhere after everything that had happened, but I was riding an adrenaline high and felt invincible. Either that, or I was more fucked up in the head than I thought.

"As per U.S. Code: Title 18, Sections 249 and 2340A - hate crimes and torture, which your delightful friend here committed a hundred times over, qualify as federal offenses. Throw in the fact that he's probably serial murdered his way across several states, and you'll more than likely be sharing those glorious breasts of yours with a bunk mate named Bertha in a federal prison."

I rolled my eyes. "Disregarding the fact that you check out my boobs, which is extremely tacky considering who _your _bedmate is, how the hell are we going to beat the FBI's forensic labs and agents? I thought we were just dealing with Andy Bellefleur and his inflated ego."

"Do the human authorities know of your ability?" Eric asked.

I nodded. "It's the worst kept secret in this town along with Jane Bodehouse's drinking problem and Arlene Fowler's desperation to trap another husband."

"Then how about a variation of the truth?"

* * *

And that's how Bud Dearborn and Andy Bellefleur came about to be in my living room at three in the morning. Mike Spencer, the parish coroner, had already come and gone with Rene's body.

Gran, showered and changed, was fast asleep in her bed. Daddy stayed behind to keep an eye on her and to make sure I'd have no problems with the officers. Pam stayed under the guise of nosiness but I had a feeling she cared more than she let on. And Eric stuck around most likely for the entertainment value.

"And you said you _heard_ him confess to killing all those women?" Andy asked.

"Yes I did, Detective Bellefleur." I barely managed to suppress an eye roll at the honorific. I was sick and tired of his thoughts. He hated the fact that my disability was the reason they solved the case. Because solving a case entailed showing up after the fact and taking credit. As if that wasn't bad enough, he was also a skeptic and preferred to believe I was crazy rather than accept the fact that the world was vastly different from what he was raised to believe.

"Miss Stackhouse, we can't have your _thing_ on official record." He said the word as if it was an STD or dirty tampon.

Daddy looked like he was close to ripping Andy's head off, while Pam appeared to be bored out of her mind. I was a mixture of the two but favored Andy losing his head more, and Eric just observed everything with an impassive expression.

I looked at Andy with wide eyed innocence and fear. I even managed some tears in my eyes and a lip tremble. "Then... what should I say happened?"

Bud looked at me pointedly and replied, "That you heard him confess to killing all those women."

Andy opened his mouth in protest, but Bud cut him off, "Eight women, sadistically murdered, would never receive the justice they deserve if Sookie here hadn't heard what she did and killed him in _self defense_."

Eric, silent throughout all of this, stood and inclined his head. "Thank you, sheriff, for demonstrating tolerance and objectivity in your judgement." He reached into his back pocket and pulled out a business card. "Call me if you ever find yourself in the position to require vampire assistance." Then he walked over to the door and opened it.

Bud took the card and read it before saying, "Will do, sheriff. And, likewise."

After some formalities, Bud and Andy finally left.

I waited until their car was out of sight before squealing and giving Eric a great big hug.

"Thank you so much!"

"If I knew I'd receive a hug for ridding you of your unwanted house guests, I'd have done it sooner." He said with a leer.

Daddy growled, so I stepped back and grinned, "That too, but mostly for the brilliant idea of letting _them _deal with the problem."

Pam cleared her throat, "I deserve a hug too. I endured the imbecile's endless litany of questions when I could have been between the thighs of a beau-"

I hugged the breath out of her and said, "Too. Much. Information!" I had no idea what kind of sex life she and my dad had, and I preferred to keep it that way.

Daddy held his arms open, "Gimme some sugar," I went willingly. "Proud of you baby girl. You kept it together _and _you gave 'em a dose of those crocodile tears. Taught you well, that brother of yours did."

I smiled, and it was bittersweet. "We need to find him."

With that turn in conversation, my mood plummeted and I suddenly felt very sick and very dirty. I ran to my bathroom, locked the door, and emptied my stomach of its contents. Someone knocked on the door, but I ignored it in favor of brushing my teeth. After my mouth was clean, I turned the water on to as hot as I could handle it and stepped inside, tank top and sleep shorts and all. I scrubbed every inch of my skin and scalp but I still felt dirty. The images I saw inside Rene's head were so sickening that I felt I'd never be clean again. But that wasn't my main concern. I felt no remorse for shooting him, and that worried me. Was I so damaged that killing a man in cold blood didn't even rank among the list of things I regretted? I didn't know how to feel about this revelation. I tried to rationalize it by telling myself that I rid the world of an evil, I killed a monster. And he was. But he was also flesh and blood, and life. And I was responsible for taking that away from a person; their life, their right to exist. I tried imagining it was someone else, and the thought made me ill. So it was just him, just his life that I was alright with ending. Was it because he was going to kill me? Partially. It was also because of what he had already done to the others, but mostly, it was because he tried to kill my Gran. And I couldn't tolerate losing someone else I loved.

I took my clothes off and rewashed my body. I had no qualms about killing when it came to protecting those I loved. Okay, I could live with that.

* * *

**A/N: so.. They finally meet.. It was a lot less anticlimacticy when I envisioned it way back in chapter 1. in fact, it was porntastic. I just didn't take into account how papa bear Corbett would react or how big of a cockblocker Pam would be, or how an eager beaver Sookie wouldn't make sense in this story.**

**im sorry if I disappointed, but hang in there! These two will get their lemons eventually**


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter 10

**2004**

**SPOV**

I hadn't seen Eric since the night of Gran's attack back in April, so I was more than surprised when he strode into Merlotte's late one night on the second week of June. Wearing a plain black T, black jeans, and boots, he somehow managed to look both casual and imposing at the same time.

Dawn rushed over to seat him in her section and I picked up from her mind that they'd had sex last year in Fangtasia. It had been a one time thing, though not for her lack of trying. He never screwed the same woman twice, no exceptions.

Apparently, Dawn thought she was exempt from that rule. She was pretty and had an amazing figure that women would kill for, but that was pretty much all she had going for her. She was also excited to see Eric and wondered how he knew where she worked. Her thoughts then strayed to the memory of a certain part of his anatomy and my eyes, widened in disbelief, wandered to the front of his jeans. I chewed my lip and wondered how the hell he got _that _to fit in there?

She must've remembered wrong, that was the only explanation. It wasn't uncommon for memories to be distorted by personal feelings and such. One of Arlene's ex husbands used to picture her as a fire breathing hag who had talons that clawed money out of his hands. To be fair, that was towards the end of their marriage though.

Eric cleared his throat. I looked up from his crotch to see a smirk on his face.

Busted.

I was blushing something fierce when he waved off Dawn and swaggered over to me.

He inclined his head. "Miss Stackhouse."

"Hi Eric, and it's Sookie," I smiled at him. He saved my life, kept my dad from being dead-dead, and helped save Gran. He more than earned the right to be on a first name basis with me. Hell, he could've asked for my paycheck and I'd have happily handed it over. "What are you doing all the way out here?"

He glanced at Sam who was watching us from behind the bar, and said, "Is there somewhere we can speak in private?"

"Yeah, but I'm on the clock right now." I looked at my watch, "My shift's ending in an hour, if you want to wait."

He nodded, "I'll have a Tru Blood then."

I led him to a booth in the back, cleared the utensils, and asked, "What type?"

"Surprise me." He droned.

I had a pretty good feeling that Eric wasn't even going to touch the drink, nonetheless drink it, but I decided on the one Daddy and Pam said tasted the least like dirt. When I moved to grab an AB negative from behind the bar, Sam got in my face and asked, "Why's he here?"

"To enjoy the ambiance."

"Sookie, why are you always so goddamn difficult? It was a legitimate question, I think I deserve a legitimate answer."

"I don't know," Seeing the incredulous look on his face, I blew out a breath of air, and huffed, "I really don't! Look, if you're so freaking curious then why don't you go over there and ask him yourself?"

After nuking the Tru Blood for the recommended fifteen seconds, I put the lid back on, shook it, and poured it into a wine glass. I placed the drink and a napkin on a tray, and brought it over to Eric.

He was in, what I called, downtime. It was freaky how still vampires could get. The first time I saw Daddy do it, I almost cried because it didn't truly hit me until then that he was dead; in a sense, anyway. I also thanked my lucky stars for the existence of the magic, or whatever is was, that reanimated him.

Not wanting to disturb Eric, I placed his drink quietly on the table in front of him and left to check on the other customers.

I was tallying up the tab for one of my tables when Dawn bumped into me from behind.

"Skank," she muttered, as she filled a pitcher of beer.

"Test Drive," I replied.

"Don't go thinking you're something special just 'cause he's paying you any attention. He'll forget your name the second he blows his load, trust me."

I gasped and slapped a hand over my mouth, "A man who's only after sex? However will I endeavor after such a groundbreaking revelation?"

She turned to leave with the now full pitcher in her hands but hesitated, "I'm serious Sookie, he _never_ goes back for seconds. You're only gonna get hurt."

I eyed her warily and dipped into her mind. There were traces of jealousy and damaged pride, but she seemed to be genuinely looking out for me. Did women do this with each other? Was this sharing of "who not to fuck" part of some sort of girl code or sisterhood ritual that I wasn't aware of?

I shook my head, "Don't worry about it."

And I meant it. Eric was great, amazing, in fact. But, he and I would never be. Not only because I knew I didn't have the power to keep him bound to me, (and that's exactly what being with only one woman would be for him, a leash; a collar; a prison) because from everything I heard about him from Pam, he enjoyed his freedom and autonomy above all. Our complicated relationship would also make pursuing anything sexual, however shallow and short lived it may be, impractical and selfish as all get out. Daddy was connected to him for an eternity; whatever passing fancy I had for Eric wasn't worth dooming Daddy to an eternity of awkwardness around his grand-maker. In the grand scheme of things, I was nothing but a blink, a distant memory, a speck of dust. But they were forever.

Besides, even if he was interested in a quick fuck, I wasn't. I wasn't _that_ girl. I could never just be _that _girl. That was what Michelle was to too many men who entered and exited our lives throughout the nights, and I promised myself I would never allow myself to be degraded like her. Never be a faceless body with a hole to fill, someone men crept to when their wives were asleep, a quick and easy-

"Don't come cryin' to me after your cherry's popped and you find your heart broken into a million tiny pieces." Dawn said, startling me out of my musings.

My face flushed. I really hated how small this goddamn town was.

The rest of the night went by quickly and, before I knew it, I was throwing my apron in the laundry bag and grabbing my purse from Sam's office.

"The vampire's still here," my boss said.

I stared at him blankly and wished he'd just get to the point.

He ran his fingers messily through his strawberry blonde hair, and sighed. "Look, I know you have no reason to trust me, but just listen for a sec, alright?"

Jesus Christ Shepherd of Judaea! Why did everyone and their momma think they were entitled to an opinion tonight? Knowing he'd never let it go until I listened, I grunted and crossed my arms under my chest.

Sam got out of his chair and walked over to face me.

I had a feeling I'd regret it, but I dipped into his head and sure enough, snarly and red images of me naked with fang marks on my neck, breasts, and thighs flashed through his mind. Oh, he better not put words to those nasty thoughts of his.

"They may look, act, and speak like they're one of us, but they're not. Not even close. They're soulless, immoral creatures who take what they want from you whether you allow it or not. The kicker? You'd never even know it happened, 'cause they got that glamour to make you forget. Sookie, listen to me, stay the hell away from him and for once in your life, quit being so goddamn stupid."

Was I hearing his dumbass correctly?

Hackles raised, I got in his face and whispered, "Did you just call my Daddy a rapist?"

Before his feeble little mind even began to realize that my _father _was among the 'soulless, immoral creatures' he'd just insulted, I swiveled the right side of my body back then, using the momentum, I propelled all my weight forward into my right arm and punched him square in his Adam's apple.

He went down in a heap. My brother would've been proud.

"Consider that my two weeks notice."

I turned around at the sound of a slow clap. Legs crossed at the ankles, Eric was leaning against the doorframe and looking amused as hell.

I dipped him a mock curtsy, adjusted my purse, and asked, "Where to?"

* * *

I was sitting on the porch swing outside of my house, enjoying the balmy night air and mulling over Eric's proposition.

He'd originally intended to ask me to go to Fangtasia on my next night off and listen in on his staff. Someone was stealing money from him, fifty thousand dollars to be exact, and he wanted to know who. Why he didn't just glamour it out of them was anyone's guess, but I'd already made up my mind and would agree to do it - it was the least I could do after everything he'd done for my family.

However, since I'd just become unemployed without lining up a job first, he offered me a position on his staff. On paper, I'd be a financial consultant. I guess it didn't matter that I'd never even graduated high school, nonetheless earn a college degree in whatever major it was that financial consultants studied in because in reality, I'd be his telepath. Not the kingdom's, not the queen's, _his_. He said my ability would be kept a secret because once news got out, I'd be facing one of three possible scenarios:

I could be killed so no one would have to worry about having their secrets exposed.

I could be claimed by Sophie-Ann Leclerq, the Queen of Louisiana, as her personal pet or telepath.

Or I could be taken by another kingdom and be forced to feed, fuck, and read whomever the monarch wanted me to.

"They can't do that! We have laws against slavery in this country."

I felt stupid the second those words left my mouth. Slavery still existed, it was just less blatant now. Women and girls were forced into slavery everyday by sex traffickers. I'd once read the mind of a prostitute in New Orleans, it was utterly depressing. She was forced into the profession when she was only fifteen by a man who told her he loved her and showered her with little trinkets. When he asked her to move to his home state, she didn't even hesitate. Once there, his demeanor began to change. Eventually, he asked her to help him pay off his debts by sleeping with a guy who'd loaned him some money. She reluctantly agreed and did it once but refused to do it again, even after he threatened to break up with her. The second and third times she'd slept with another man for money was because her "boyfriend" changed tactics and decided beating her was more effective and yielded quicker results. After she decided to get help and leave him, he shot her up with heroine against her will to force her compliance. That was the beginning of the end for her; he'd been her pusher and pimp for the last twenty years. Her tragic tale of betrayal was only a drop in the ocean; I'd read once that the actual number of trafficked women in America alone was upwards of sixty thousand. And that number didn't even include the pets vampires had under their thrall.

"You would be willing." He replied, sitting sideways on the railing; legs straight, back against the pillar, eyes gazing up at the stars.

I lifted my feet from the ground and tucked them under me. "Nope, can't be glamoured." With a little grin, I added, "I still remember meeting you all those years ago... It's not everyday a girl gets to fly."

He seemed taken aback by the news and his blue eyes took on a thoughtful glint. Apparently, Pam kept a lot of things from him. I was beginning to wonder if maybe she had a point. Could I really trust him if his own child seemed reticent to do so?

"She's a better friend to you than you know." Eric said darkly.

Having friends wasn't a concept I was familiar with; I never had any growing up. As if being the freak of the town with my mind reading wasn't bad enough, Jason and I got teased for having the town slut (who slept with half the kids in our school's fathers) as a mother, and for being dirt poor and wearing dirty old clothes that never fit properly to school. Hell, we had lice for as long as I could remember. Nobody, but nobody, wanted to be my friend. Jason at least had Hoyt Fortenberry, but even Hoyt stayed away from me because his momma wouldn't allow him to fraternize with Michelle's daughter.

I shrugged and returned to a topic I was more comfortable with; my baleful future as a sex and blood slave. "Since I can't be glamoured, I could always run away or call for help during the day even if they kidnap me."

Eric turned his head and looked at me pitifully. "Glamour isn't the only method of ensuring a human's submission."

I was positive I didn't want to know what the other 'methods' were. Anything that would force someone into willing slavery was more than likely going to be cruel and sadistic. "Don't look at me like that, I don't need your pity." I nudged him with my toes and said with a cajoling smile, "I wouldn't be so naive if you taught me how to stay alive and free in your world."

He stretched lazily and I took the time to admire his body. Broad shoulders and defined arms, a muscular chest with definition I could see through the tight fitted black T, a long torso that tapered into narrow hips, and long legs that that ended in a pair of bad ass shit kicker boots.

"If you were to agree to my terms and work for me, you would be under my protection."

I placed one foot on the floor and kicked gently, slowly rocking the swing. "Aren't I already? I mean, I'm under Daddy's protection and he's of your blood, so wouldn't I already be safe?"

"In theory, yes. In fact, no. My connection can only get you so far. Any vampire can challenge your father for you. Any vampire within the political hierarchy can simply take you. Remember, before the Great Revelation vampires were forced to abandon their former lives. We do not yet have laws on the legality of taking one's human relations." He paused. "I doubt there will be any soon, either."

Because humans were food, and food didn't garner much thought other than when you're hungry or already eating. I wasn't angry, it was just how things were to them. This whole coming out business was a big change for them too, and it seemed the older they were, the slower they were about getting things done. I suppose time no longer held the same weight when you lived forever.

He continued, "Possessions such as pets and humans under our employ are protected, yes. Human mates, rare as they are, are also under protection. But depending on the reigning power, it may not even be a punishable offense if someone were to forcibly make you their pet. Corbett would be recompensated for a bruised ego, nothing more."

I mulled that over. On the one hand, I'd be a lot safer if I was under Eric's protection. But on the other, I wouldn't even need the protection if I didn't expose myself to other vampires by working for him. So I told him so.

"If you're certain you would never cross paths with another vampire while being so enmeshed in your father's life, then forget my offer."

Well, fuck. "You know I was going to do it for free right?"

He slid off the railing and got down on his haunches in front of me. "Never underestimate your worth."

My breath caught. He truly was beautiful. His wasn't the perfect kind of beauty. Those men never held my interest or attention for long; oddly enough, I found them boring to look at. I'd feel an unreasonable amount of annoyance when I tried to find something wrong, maybe a freckle or an untamed eyebrow, but all I'd find was more perfection. No, Eric was anything but boring. His nose was slightly too big, but you'd never be able to tell when looking at the entire six and a half foot package. It was also slightly off center, but that only added character and distinction to his face and almost made him seem human; relatable, attainable. It almost made you forget he was a vampire. And that would be a dangerous oversight. I could stare at his perfect imperfections forever and not be bored.

Shit, did I really just think that? Up until that point, I was certain I'd never want to be a vampire. I loved the sun and I enjoyed food (a little too much, depending on who you asked). Could I really give them up for an eternity of nights? I shook my head; now was not the time for worries of tomorrow.

"In all my years, I have never encountered another telepath. Your gift could start wars, save lives, and make an insurmountable amount of money. Yet you choose to wait tables and serve these idiots who doubt your ability and question your sanity." He tucked a loose strand of hair behind my ear. "Why?"

Uneasy with the direction the conversation was headed, I looked down and didn't respond. How did you tell someone you've just met, yet idolized for most of your childhood, that you were damaged beyond repair? That your self worth is so skewed that compliments make you uncomfortable and kindness makes you look for ulterior motives? That your mother told you so many times that you were worth shit, that you eventually believed it and became afraid of failing so much that you stopped trying altogether?

He placed a finger under my chin and lifted it. "You'll tell me when you're ready. I won't force you." Then, he raised an eyebrow and asked, "Test drive?"

Cheese and rice, damn that vampire hearing! I groaned internally and shrugged, "Everyone gets a free ride but no one wants to keep it." I knew I was blushing something fierce, but I just had to know, "how much of our convo did you hear?"

His fangs dropped.

Oh.

Eric stood and held his hand out. "Your father tells me you've already mastered public etiquette towards vampires."

I took his proffered hand and stood to join him. "I don't know about 'mastered', but I know when to play the obedient daughter and keep my mouth shut."

"Good. You will need to show deference to me at Fangtasia."

I nodded. "You, sheriff. Me, human. Got it, boss."

And I did, vampires were all about appearances. A human treating him like an equal would be seen as a weakness and cause others to question his dominion.

He made a move towards me, but hesitated and stood his ground. He looked angry all of a sudden, and I wasn't sure if it was directed at me or himself.

"A contract will be waiting for you at Fangtasia tomorrow night. Be there at six." He said gruffly.

Without another word, he turned, got into his cherry red Corvette, and took off.

* * *

**A/N: Ooooh, he mad! I wonder why? ;)**

**Thank you for all the lovely reviews for chapter 9! Im so glad I have such an amazing group of readers who truly understand the direction this story is going. It feels fuckawesome to know you guys just _get it._ **


	11. Chapter 11

Chapter 11

**SPOV**

"Gran, I'm pretty sure Daddy and Pam didn't give you their blood just so you could go and break your back chopping wood." I said, unloading the bags of groceries from my car.

She almost died two months ago, but you wouldn't know it from looking at her. Vampire blood apparently did more than heal injuries. Gran was seventy-one years old but she had as much strength and stamina as someone half her age. Daddy wasn't sure how it affected her heart, so he told her to take it easy because she might just give herself a heart attack. Oh she listened alright, for about two days. Then she discovered she didn't tire as easily anymore and had been running around like she was superwoman ever since.

She swung the axe down, splitting the wood into two pieces. "Hush child, I haven't felt this spry in decades. Let me enjoy feeling useful again."

"You're plenty useful!" I said, exasperated. "You do more around the house in a day than most women in this town do in a week."

"That's because everyone's out making a living," Gran admonished. "Used to be, one paycheck was enough to run a household and put good food on the table. Mothers had the luxury of staying home with their babies. Now, even with two paychecks, you have to pinch pennies to get by." She finished, shaking her head.

I shifted the bags. "Women also _like_ being self sufficient now, don't forget. We have different priorities too." Deciding to test the waters, I added nonchalantly, "Some women don't even want children."

She placed another piece of wood on the stump and swung. "Nonsense, motherhood was the best thing to ever happen to me. You'll love it too."

"Gran," I said softly, "I'm happy that you enjoyed that part of your life with Daddy and Aunt Linda, but not everyone's cut out for it."

She put the axe down and walked over to me. "You'll be a wonderful mother when the time comes, dear."

"Oh, I don't doubt that one bit. But I don't plan on having children. Ever. I would hate to pass my disability onto another person, especially an itty bitty one that I loved more than anything."

Gran looked at me, regret wriitten all over her face. "If I'd known drinking that glass of wine all those years ago would sentence you to a lifetime of unhappiness, I'd never have even looked at it."

Being descendants of the fae weren't the only secrets my grandmother kept from us. The night after Daddy came back to us two years ago, Gran sat us down and told us a story about a demon who befriended a fae prince and who, with a thimble of his blood in an unsuspecting young woman's wine, bestowed upon the fae's human descendants a gift. After I calmed down enough for her to explain that demons weren't exclusive to Christianity, she guiltily explained something else. Gran said the gift was supposed to give Fintan's line an advantage over other humans, but only those with an essential spark would receive the gift. Out of everyone in my family, I drew the short straw and ended up with the prize. It wasn't an exact science, the spark, so as far as I knew, any hypothetical children I would have had a fifty percent chance of inheriting my disability.

While I wanted to tell Gran that I wasn't upset with her, a tiny little part of me, the part that longed for normalcy, was still bitter that one single action on her part changed my life forever. So, I simply nodded, readjusted the bags for a better grip, and went inside.

Gran came inside a short while later and began helping me put the groceries away.

"What time are you heading out?"

"Five. I'm supposed to be there at six to look over the contract and I figured I'd get there about half an hour early to familiarize myself with the bar and staff."

She nodded. "Then we'll have an early supper before you leave."

I paused, butter halfway to the fridge, and frowned. She offered to inconvenience herself for me even though I'd acted like an ass towards her. I felt horrible for being so dismissive of her earlier apology when she'd been nothing but kind and accepting of me all these years.

"Gran?"

"Yes, dear."

"I'm sorry I made you feel bad about something you had no control over." Because my disability didn't come from her affair, and even though she did drink the wine, she had no idea there was magic in it. No, my disability came from that rotund and cheerful demon named Cat-a-whatever his name was. So if I were the type to place blame on someone, it'd be on Fintan or the Cat.

Gran turned to study my face. I guess she saw my sincerity, because she nodded and said, "We're having chicken fried steak with mashed and gravy for supper."

"Sounds good, Gran." I replied, with a little smile. Gran's chicken fried steak was my favorite.

I spent the rest of the day lying out in the sun in between putting in loads of laundry. Call me vain, but I wanted to look good when I saw Eric later that night, and nothing looked better than the natural glow of a new tan.

I started getting ready around three. After a nice warm bath where I even used some of the moisturizing milk beads I bought from Walmart, I shaved all my parts that needed shaving, swept my hair into a messy chignon, pulled some pieces of hair out of the pins to frame my face, and stood in front of my admittedly unimpressive closet. I ran my fingers over a white sundress with pretty red flowers but decided against it. The symbolism of the colors weren't lost on me, and I definitely wasn't down with playing those type of mind games with Eric. It was never a good idea to tease vampires. Next, I decided against a black dress that I'd only worn to funerals. Black was the unofficial color of Fangtasia's clientele; I wasn't there for pleasure so, to avoid any unnecessary confusion, I forwent that little number. I skipped over two pastel colored Sunday dresses, and grabbed a dress that I'd worn only once before.

It was a royal blue ruched jersey dress that I'd ordered from the Victoria's Secret Catalogue. They named it, The Convertible Dress. I thought Transformer Dress would've been more fitting, seeing as how it could literally be worn over a dozen ways. It cost me a pretty penny, including taxes and shipping and handling, it came out to a little over a hundred dollars. It was the most expensive thing I'd ever purchased for myself, but since I really was paying for twelve dresses, I thought it was a steal.

After adjusting it every which way, I decided on the one shoulder version that covered most of my chest. All the other options of wearing the dress seemed to emphasize my girls and while I was proud of my body, I didn't want my breasts to be the focal point of tonight's meeting. Truth be told, I wanted to make a good impression on Eric. I would never be the smartest woman in the room or the most beautiful, but I sure as hell could try for interesting.

The doorbell rang as I was stepping into my shoes. Gran didn't mention anyone was dropping by, so I opened my shields to see who was at the door. I started at what I heard, then quickly went to greet our visitors.

"Are you lost, dear?" Gran asked.

A man was standing outside of our door holding a toddler in his arms. The boy looked exhausted and had noticeable dark circles under his eyes.

"I sure hope not, are you Hadley's kin?" Said the man,

_Hi, I'm Sookie. What's your name?_, I thought.

The boy looked confused. _Did the pretty lady just say that out loud?_

"I'm her grandmother. And you are?" Gran's question sounded almost hopeful.

I grinned. _Nope, I'm projecting my thoughts to you._

The boy's eyes widened in surprise. _You're like me!_

"Her husband, and this here's our son, Hunter."

I smiled. _Seems that way, doesn't it, Hunter?_

Gran looked positively giddy as she ushered them inside. "Come in, come in!"

She led them to the living room while I hurried to the kitchen to prepare some snacks and drinks.

I grabbed a pitcher of sweet tea from the fridge, placed it and four cups on a tray, and plated some oatmeal chocolate chip cookies from the cookie jar.

_Hey Hunter, you want milk or sweet tea with your cookies? _

_Milk, please! _He responded automatically.

After pouring Hunter his milk, I hefted the tray in both hands and went to join everyone in the living room.

"Alright, now that everyone who can be here is here right now, why don't you tell us what's going on, Remy."

Remy took a glass from me gratefully and took a long swig. It was the middle of June and hot enough to fry eggs on the pavement. Thankfully, Daddy installed central air for us two Christmases ago so our living room was at a comfortable 72 degrees.

_My mommy left us. _He said while nibbling on a cookie.

_She did what?!_

"Hadley upped and left 'bout four months ago. Didn't say where she was headed or nothin', just packed her bags one night and took off."

Gran looked mad enough to spit nails. "Why, of all the selfish and irresponsible things she's ever done in her life... to leave her baby behind? Did she try contacting you afterwards?"

I dipped into Remy's head. Hadley was yelling about how she was going crazy. She said she couldn't do it anymore, that she tried but being a mother was too hard for her. Especially since Hunter wasn't a normal kid and needed special care. Remy asked her what she expected him to do, he was as lost as she was. Hadley told him to find her "crazy cousin Sookie, she got the same problem as Hunter."

Good God, that woman was vile. I slammed my shield down on Remy's thoughts but not before one slipped through. He was terrified of his own son.

Hunter frowned as he chewed his cookie. _Daddy been thinking 'bout it more and more since mommy left. I got real scared when I heard him thinking we was coming today... But I'm not anymore!_

_Because I'm a telepath too?_

_A tele-what?! _He asked, eyes wide.

I refrained from chuckling and replied, _Telepath, it means mind reader._

He shook his head. _Oh! Naw, that's not why._

_You gonna tell me why or you gonna make me guess? _I asked, eyes narrowed in mock annoyance.

He cackled. _You're not gonna guess! You'd just get it from my head!_

"She _is _like him." Remy said, slack-jawed.

_Oops, I guess our secret's out. _I thought.

"Hunter can read minds too?" Gran asked, clutching her hands over her heart.

Remy nodded. "Hadley said she had a cousin who was like our boy. But like everything else she says, I took that with a grain of salt."

_I'm a good boy. I eat my ve-ge-ta-bles _he thought slowly, sounding the word out in his head. _I can almost tie my shoes. And I almost never wet the bed anymore._

_Well, sir, if that's not a good boy then I don't know what is._

He gave me a smile that stretched across his entire face. _Then you'll keep me?_

Wait, what?

"Look, I'm real sorry to spring this on you, but I got no other choice. Hunter ain't sleeping at night, says my thoughts are too loud. And he's scared off three of our sitters and a couple'a our neighbors. I can't keep taking off to watch him... I been seeing a real good woman for a while now. She wants to get married, have our own kids and..." He looked at Hunter apologetically, "first time she met Hunt, he scared her off and now she's afraid to come over again."

I felt my face turning red with anger, but Gran beat me to the punch.

"Stackhouses take care of our own, don't you worry about it, Mr. Savoy. When can you move Hunter's belongings over?"

_He's scared of me. _Hunter thought sadly.

I sighed internally. _My mom was scared of me too, but Gran's tough as nails. Nothing ever scares her._

_Nothing? _He asked doubtfully

_Nope, not even my vampire daddy._

His eyed were wide as saucers. _Your daddy's a vampire?!_

I grinned. _Yup, and so's my friend, Pam. _And the guy who's gonna be my boss in a few hours, I added to myself. But of course Hunter heard it too.

_Three?! You know three vampires?!_

_And you will too. Well, you'll get to meet two of them at least. My daddy's probably gonna come over later tonight if he knows you're here. Your grandma was his baby sister, ya know._

I stood up, walked over to Hunter and held my hand out. _Wanna pick out your new room?_

_Yeah!_

In the end, we decided to give him my room because it just didn't make sense for a two and a half year old to sleep on a separate floor from the adults in the house.

Gran was feeling mighty angry because she waited for Remy to leave before starting supper. It was unheard of in our household, for her to not invite a guest to stay for a meal. But he made an enemy out of Adele Stackhouse by not even pretending to want to take Hunter home with him for one last night together.

I had a feeling Hadley wasn't fairing much better in Gran's mind either.

It was a little after five when we finished dinner. By the time I did the dishes, I had just enough time to make it to Fangtasia on time for my... It wasn't a job interview, nor was it my first night on the job. I settled for "contract negotiation" as I quickly applied a thin layer of clear lipgloss on my lips and grabbed the matching clutch to my nude colored pumps.

I slipped on the thin gold bangles that Pam gifted me last Christmas and put on a pair of gold stud earrings in the shape of a knot ."You gonna call Daddy later when he wakes up, or should I tell him the good news at work?"

"This is the kind of news you tell in person, dear."

I nodded, gave Gran and Hunter a hug, and left for Shreveport.

* * *

I pulled into Fangtasia's parking lot with five minutes to spare. It was still too early for customers and, other than a handful of cars, the parking lot was empty so I went in through the employee entrance in the back.

I stood in the hallway and took everything in. It was my first time in Fangtasia and I could honestly say, if I wasn't paid to be there, I'd never have willingly step foot into the place otherwise. Whoever decorated the bar needed to be fired. Immediately. Only one word came to mind in terms of description, "cheesy." Dark greys, blacks, and reds; walls lined with framed pictures of every single silver screen vampire to have helmed a vampire movie, with one notable exception - Max Schreck who starred in Nosferatu. To be fair though, Nosferatu was ugly as all get out. I sure wouldn't have wanted all humans to be associated with a falsified and extremely hideous depiction of us. Like that caveman guy in the Geico commercials.

A woman with long strawberry blonde hair that desperately needed a good conditioner and comb, was sitting on a bar stool. She wore a long black gown, a cheaply made Elvira knockoff that displayed every single one of the fang marks on her neck, and had cleavage bolstered by the hardest working push-up bra in creation. No one's boobs were, nor should they ever be, up to their collarbone.

An itty bitty woman with bleached blonde hair, self tanner two shades too dark, an assload of baby blue eyeshadow and frosting pink lipstick, was wearing a denim belt as a skirt and a mid drift baring silver tube top. She was sweeping the floor and seemed a bit too jumpy for someone performing such a mundane task. Her wrists, neck, and from what I glimpsed of her thighs, were all covered in fang marks. The saying, "afraid of her own shadow", came to mind and I was curious enough to dip into her thoughts.

_Did I forget to turn off the stove? I think I remember I did, but what if I didn't? When did I last use it? Oh right, when I heated up some spaghetti-o's for Harry and Charlaine for lunch. They're not home now but what if the house blows up when Sue-Anne drops my babies off in the morning? Oh God, oh God, oh God! I don't wanna lose my babies!_

Her brain had more holes than Swiss cheese. Someone was glamouring her on a regular basis and if they didn't stop soon, the woman was sure to end up in a padded cell somewhere for the rest of her life.

Three other women, two more blondes and one brunette, were in varying colors of the same outfit. Necks full of fang bites, plunging v-neck halter dresses and slinky heels; I wondered if they coordinated before leaving the house or if this was their uniform. The blonde wearing the red dress was behind the bar cutting up garnishes while the blonde in the black dress was wiping down the tables. The last of the trio, the dark haired waitress, was emptying out the garbage cans in the two bathrooms.

Since everyone was busy except for the Mistress of the Dark perched on the bar stool, I sidled up next to her and extended my hand to introduce myself then thought better of it and quickly withdrew my hand. Her nails were chewed to the quick and yet she still somehow managed to find more real estate to nibble on in between taking drags from a cigarette. The woman was either high as a kite or as nervous as a whore in a church. I really didn't want to do it, because I felt dirty just looking at her, but I slipped into her mind anyway and quickly found the cause of her nerves.

"Hi, I'm Sookie Stackhouse, Mr. Northman's financial consultant."

"Why umm.. Why are you here?"

_Shit, he knows! First the accountant, and now her. I wished I'd listened to my gut and gotten on the first greyhound to Ricky's when I had the chance. Maybe if I tell Eric what I know about the money, he'll let me live. But if I do, _he_will kill me. _

No matter how hard I dug, I couldn't seem to find the "he" in question. It was almost as if his picture was erased or, the more likely explanation, she was glamoured to forget.

"Oh, I'm just here to go through some papers and verify some things for Mr. Northman."

_I'm so screwed! Maybe the master will protect me. _She looked at her watch, _Maybe I still have time to catch the next bus to Tennessee._

I stood and walled her in. "So, what's your name-"

She backed up and hissed, "Get the fuck away from me!"

I held my hands up, "I was just trying to make conversation, sorry if I offended."

She relaxed slightly, but her eyes kept glancing at the hallway. Just when she was about to bolt again, the back door swung open and Eric waltzed into the bar, followed shortly by my Daddy and Pam, and another vampire I'd never met before. From shooting the shit with Daddy in the past, I knew the vampire was Long Shadow, a Native American who got turned before our country was even established. He was also one fourth of Fangtasia's four owners; Daddy, Eric and Pam being the other three.

At seeing the arrival of reinforcements, I sighed a breath of relief. First things first, I nodded to all four vampires. Pam gave me an appreciative once over that made me feel as if she was stripping me naked with her perusal. Eric nodded back but I was otherwise invisible to him. Okay, then. Long Shadow ogled me as if I was a piece of candy and he, a fat kid in the candy shop. I shuddered. His fangs clicked into place. Fucking creep.

Daddy side eyed the shit out of Long Shadow, and gave me a lopsided grin. "Beautiful,"

"Don't tell me, I know." Pam deadpanned.

I wanted to tell Daddy about the newest addition to our household, but Elvira was filled with so much anxiety, _I _was close to bursting.

"Mr. Northman, may I have a word with you in private?"

He nodded once and turned to head back down the hallway. I didn't know what I expected from him this night, but it sure as hell wasn't the "I, king; you, peasant," attitude he had going on. I shrugged it off and followed like a good little worker bee. We weren't friends, barely even acquaintances. I was stupid for expecting more.

He sat in the chair behind his desk and gestured to one of the two chairs facing him. Remembering what I'd gleamed from Dawn's memories, I pulled the chair further away from the desk and perched gingerly on the edge of the seat with my legs crossed. God, I wished I had some Purell.

"You may speak."

Well la-dee-fucking-da. I barely controlled the urge to roll my eyes. "Elvira knows what happened to the money."

"There is no one named Elvira on the staff." His face was beginning to look like most of the people in town who questioned my disability or my sanity.

I hated to admit it, that I let him affect me so much, but it hurt to see that look on his face. I put a bandaid on my aching heart, swallowed the lump forming in my throat, and replied, "Elvira, the Mistress of the Damned? The movie character?"

"Which waitress?" He asked, ignoring my pop culture reference. I decided right then and there that I hated Fangtasia Eric.

My eye twitched from suppressing all of the pent up emotions he incited by acting like a cold, uncaring ass. "She was sitting on the barstool."

A second later, Pam opened the door and asked, "Who am I killing?"

"Bring in Belinda."

Pam dropped her fangs, gave him a fangy grin, and said, "With pleasure."

The girl was shaking like a leaf by the time she sat down in a chair that Eric had moved to the center of the room. By then, all of the vampires in attendance had joined us in the room. I got down on my haunches in front of Belinda, and reached for her hands.

She flung my hands away, "Don't fucking touch me," she hissed.

It was said with such vitriol that all of the vampires tensed. The room was now brimming with energy, and being only one of two humans, I felt like a lamb on the chopping block.

"Pam," Eric said.

She immediately appeared behind Belinda and gripped her upper arms, holding her still for my questioning. Belinda struggled but Pam had an iron grip on her. She wasn't going anywhere without the vampire's say so.

My hands circled her skinny wrists. "Did you take the money?"

She cursed and called me every nasty name under the sun. I tightened my hold on her wrists and went spelunking in her mind. If I had to give a texture to people's thoughts, they're usually smooth, even the nasty ones. But Belinda's memories of Eric's missing money were so riddled with holes that I felt like I was exploring a cave or tiptoeing through a bombed site.

"She knows who took it," I said to Eric.

Even physical contact couldn't break the glamour. So I concentrated and pushed harder with my mind and tried to somehow slip into the gaps. I had no idea what I was doing, I'd never done it before, and could only hope I didn't fuck Belinda's head up anymore than it already was.

Belinda began screaming bloody murder. Wailing like a damned banshee.

"A man's involved and I'm pretty sure he's either a vampire or he's got one on his payroll, because she can't picture him in her head at all, like there's some sort of compulsion."

I pushed harder, going over one of the holes repeatedly, hoping to somehow fill it in or gleam something from it. Belatedly, I realized I was rubbing circles on her wrist, similar to what I was doing to the area of her missing memory. The hole was still in her mind but _something_ was happening. I felt wetness over my upper lip but I ignored it, and kept pushing. Someone was speaking, no, yelling at me but I ignored that too. My head felt foggy, my eyes blurry, but still I pushed. Until, finally, I was there. I watched, transfixed, as the scene played out infront of me. And then, I knew.

I released Belinda and turned. Every vampire in the room was frozen, but their eyes were staring at something on my face. I reached my hand up and felt wetness under my nose. It was blood, I was bleeding from whatever I'd done to the girl. Then it hit me, Daddy's words from two years ago, "Never bleed around a vampire." I was _so _fucked.

Eric, being the oldest, was the first to regain control. Everyone else seemed almost afraid to move, afraid to breathe. Not that they breathed.

"Pam," he said, hungry eyes on me. Great, after all the work I put into my appearance, the only time he bothered looking at me was when I really, really didn't want him to.

It took her a second, but she visibly reigned her hunger in and opened the door. "Ginger, Yvetta, and the other two, inside. Now."

I swallowed thickly, hoping I wasn't going to have to stay for the show. Then I remembered what I saw and my stupid, stupid eyes wandered over to Long Shadow.

Then he was on me.

In a desperate act of self preservation, I threw my arms up to cover my neck. And that's what he bit into savagely, tearing into my arm like a starved lion. I tried to scream but the impact from his lunge took all the air from my lungs. I kicked and punched with my other arm but realized in horror that it was doing nothing but exciting him even more. He pressed harder into me then, eyes widened in shock, his face began to wrinkle then cave in on itself. His hair fell in clumps onto my face, and suddenly, someone grabbed me.

The next thing I knew, I was outside of the bar in Eric's arms.

* * *

**A/N: I think I like hot and cold Eric. Well, mostly cold, or more like freezing. He's interesting to write :D I think I might keep him for the rest of the story... No? Well, alright, maybe just for another couple of chapters then. :D :D**

**I took some liberties with Ginger and Belinda's characters. SVM Ginger is the strawberry blonde with shit for brains and a hardon for Eric. Belinda was the smart one. Neither are too bright here, but I absolutely LOVE True Blood Ginger! I remember watching a compilation of her scenes on YouTube and just kept replaying the one where she was riding Pam's coffin like a bull, and screaming bloody murder, over and over again. TB Ginger is a gem lol**

**I posted some links to pics of Sookie and Pam's outfits, and who I imagined Corbett as (ermahgawd droool!), in my profile. Feel free to click away :D**


	12. Chapter 12

Chapter 12

**SPOV**

We were in the air, flying. It took some maneuvering, but my head was cradled against Eric's chest, and my mangled arm rested uncomfortably against my chest.

It was only moments ago that Longshadow used my arm as a chew toy, tearing skin and arm tissue. During the attack, I was too busy fighting back to pay attention to the state of my arm lodged between Longshadow's jaws. Everything happened so fast; one second he was mauling me and the next, he seemed to be decaying in front of my eyes.

Eric was quick to pull me outside of Fangtasia before things got any worse. Luckily, it was too dark for me to see the extent of my injuries, but I was certain I'd lost a good chunk of my arm. My forearm felt as if it was on fire and my flesh, slowly melting off my bones. I was a bloody, tear soaked mess; too tired and weak to realize how suicidally insane it was for a bloody, incapacitated woman to allow a vampire near her, nonetheless carry her off to God knows where.

So I asked him, "Where we goin?"

"My nearest safe house."

"Shouldn't you be taking me to a hospital?" He really should, I was sure I'd lose my arm otherwise.

"I will give you my blood."

It wasn't a question or an offer, it was an edict.

I was aware of the effects of taking vampire blood, Gran had taken Daddy and Pam's, afterall. I also knew how big of a deal it was for a vampire, especially one as old and revered as Eric, to offer. Vampires were extremely possessive of their blood, and knowing its many beneficial properties, I could understand why.

I was humbled by his gift.

And, I agreed without hesitation. Mostly because I was close to passing out from the pain, but also because you just didn't turn down a gift of that magnitude - not without seeming ungrateful or having it be monumentally insulting.

I closed my eyes and snuggled closer against him. His black tank top was thin enough for me to feel the definition of muscle on his chest.

Eric was right, I must've lost too much blood, because even though I found it a bit disconcerting to not feel his heartbeat, I still felt safe. Or maybe it was just the effect he had on me.

"Déjà vu," I whispered.

Of course, he heard me.

"Troublesome woman," he replied.

I shifted to look at his expressionless face, and instantly regretted it. Fuck, even the slightest movements made my arm feel like it was engulfed in flames. I swallowed a whimper and felt cold sweat break out all over my body. "Sorry if my near deaths have inconvenienced you." I retorted, but it lost its oomph due to how weak I sounded.

We landed in the backyard of a two story house. Eric must've been really determined to heal me since I didn't get a good look at anything else; faster than my eyes could see, we were in a black marble and granite bathroom.

"It's hereditary," he sighed while carrying me into a glass walk-in shower and slowly lowering me onto my feet.

Great, when the hell did I lose a shoe? I kicked my remaining shoe off and decided it was a good thing I was standing barefoot. My legs were a bit wobbly and I still felt very weak; add three inch heels to that combination and I was sure I'd have ended up with a cracked skull on top of a mauled arm.

"What is?" My body swayed and Eric moved to hold my arms steady. "Maybe I should sit down, I'm feeling kinda light headed."

He helped me down onto the stone bench and I tilted my head back against the cool marble wall.

"Your insolence," he replied, biting into his wrist and moving it to my lips.

Eyes on his anticipatory blue ones, I wrapped my lips around the punctured skin on bloody wrist, latched on, and sucked. Eric stiffened and I felt my cheeks flush. His eyes grew hungrier with each drag, and my heart beat faster with each swallow. My panties grew damp and I rubbed my thighs together. His nostrils flared and he made a sound deep in his throat like a growl. After a final drag, I licked his wound clean and licked my lips.

"Thanks," I said, after clearing my throat. That was not what I expected to happen. Gran didn't mention anything about, about feeling aroused. I looked at the uncomfortable bulge in Eric's jeans, apparently I wasn't the only one affected.

After a long stretch of silence, I glanced at Eric's stormy face. He looked like he was close to ripping something apart, and I was sure dentists would frown upon jaws clenched that tightly - it couldn't be healthy. His reaction threw me; if feeding someone their blood made them that horny, and thanks to Pam's over sharing I knew most vampires loved sex, I wondered why they didn't do it more often.

My arm felt weird and I looked down. My skin was torn to shreds and there was still exposed tissue and tendon. I even saw something ivory that I could've sworn was bone. I gritted my teeth as things I didn't know the names of grew, stretched and reformed, and tendon began to reknit itself together. I felt like barfing; not from the macabre scene that I was watching with a detached air, but from of the amount of pain I was in from the accelerated healing.

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, hoping it would ease the nausea, and exhaled slowly. After some time, I got my body to cooperate and began to relax.

Deciding to change the subject before he broke his jaw, I wet my lips, and said, "My daddy's got respect ingrained so deeply in him from the womb that I wouldn't be surprised to find it tattooed onto his bones."

He stared at my lips. "That's absurd,"

"Yeah, well so are you," I retorted, closing my eyes. His entire existence defied logic.

I felt a whisper of something against my lips, but it was gone so quickly I might've imagined it.

"Closing your eyes after insulting a vampire, you're either a fool or have a death wish." He murmured softly.

He placed two fingers over the carotid artery on the left side of my neck and pressed lightly. My eyes opened with the sudden feel of his cool skin on mine. His nostrils flared. He looked at me as if I was the last pint of Ben and Jerry's Chocolate Therapy on earth and he, a jilted bride after she was left standing at the alter in front of her family, friends, and a tv news crew.

The hunger in his eyes changed to something else. It was as if he was having some sort of internal struggle over something. I figured he must've been having a hard time taking my pulse and trying not to eat me at the same time. It was a good thing my fairy blood was diluted by so much of my humanity, from the way Daddy had warned me, I would've expected Eric to have drained me already.

I smiled meekly, hoping he'd get his shit under control. Although I'd learned from Pam that in a bind, wooden stiletto heels worked as stakes, I was in no shape to fend off another hungry vampire. Besides, I really, really didn't want to have to stake Eric. Not only would I have to look over my shoulders for the rest of my life for an angry and bereft Pam, I was sure I'd miss him something fierce. He was my hero, my knight, afterall. I knew my silly little crush was just that, but sometimes we all needed something to hope for. An unrealistic dream or goal. It kept this mundane existence of a life I had slightly more tolerable. I was suddenly very glad to have quit my job at Merlotte's. If I survived this night, I promised myself I'd live instead of merely existing. That included taking risks in everything from my job and wardrobe, to my outlook on life in general. Maybe I'd even get an apartment in Shreveport and move into the city - that thought was squashed as quickly as it arrived; I couldn't leave Gran to take care of Hunter on her own. I'd have to think on that some more.

I cleared my throat and eyed him warily.

That seemed to be enough to snap him out of whatever he was thinking. Satisfied that I wasn't about to have a heart attack or go into shock, he removed his fingers from my throat and carefully lifted my arm. For someone so big and imposing, he sure could be gentle.

"Yeah, well maybe I trust you." I whispered. And I did. I trusted him with my life.

It was quiet for so long that I thought he'd left. With some effort, I opened a tiny slit of my left eye, found Eric looking both perplexed and torn, then closed it again. Some time later, hell it could've been hours I was so tired, he chuckled and startled me out of my rest.

"You gonna share with the class or hoard all the jokes?"

He lowered himself to my level, "You're an extraordinary woman, Sookie Stackhouse."

"Extraordinary as in astonishing and phenomenal, or extraordinary as in peculiar and weird?"

"You've already proven yourself to be the latter," Then, he grinned wickedly and wiggled his brows, "You'll have to demonstrate the former and just-" he nuzzled my neck, "how-" he kissed my chin, "phenomenal-" he paused to stare hungrily into my eyes, and the air became so thick with tension and want and need, that I found it hard to breathe. Then, when I was close to screaming in frustration, he moved in those last few inches and said against my mouth, "you are," before gently tipping my head back and planting soft kisses across my lips.

I opened my mouth and whimpered as his cool tongue slid against mine. He growled when he tasted his blood on my tongue, and his movements became more demanding. He took instead of tease, and I loved every second of it. Hands moving my head this way and that for better access, tongue forcefully plundering every inch of my mouth, lips sucking hungrily on mine. It was the most aggressive kiss I'd ever had in my life, and I never wanted it to end.

Unfortunately, I lifted my arms, forgotten about in the heat of the moment, to grab his hair. The strain from pulling on the still delicate tissues on my right arm was the bucket of cold water I wasn't prepared for. I didn't make a sound, I didn't have to; his blood was running through my veins and he felt everything I did - however muted it may be since we barely formed a bond.

For a second, he looked confused, then seemingly realizing that the pain was coming from me, he slowly released me and sat back on his haunches.

God, he looked amazing with mussed up hair and just kissed lips. Remembering my earlier decree to live for the moment, I nodded and declared, "Challenge accepted."

Eric let out an uproarious laugh, placed a chaste kiss on my lips, and examined my arm. It was still tender and raw for the most part, but at least the wound had reknitted already. "You will not scar."

Not that it was among my list of concerns, I nodded and said gratefully, "Thank you, Eric, for everything. I know how..." What was the word I was looking for? Covetous, greedy, protective, possessive? They were all true, but none of those words embodied the seriousness or the gratitude of what I was trying to express. In the end, I decided on, "sacred vampire blood is to your kind, and well, I just want you to know how grateful and appreciative I am."

He gazed deeply into my eyes, and for a moment I wished I could read his thoughts, and inclined his head.

The moment passed, and I wondered out loud, "Why are we in the bathroom?"

"I don't want bloodstains all over my house."

I stuck my tongue out at him. Pragmatic bastard. I looked down; blood from my wound was caked onto my arm and the front of my dress. I sighed, angry and dejected over the loss of the only luxury I'd ever allowed myself; the dress was completely ruined. At least I was still alive, I thought grimly. That thought sobered me quickly.

"What happened to Longshadow?"

Eric's fangs clicked into place and his face took on a stormy expression. "He has met his final death."

I nodded, that much I suspected. "That was pretty gross... The way his face pruned and kind of caved in on itself. And don't get me started on his hair, it was falling in clumps down on my face!" I shook my head, "top five of the nastiest things I've ever seen. And I've seen a _lot _of nasty shit with my disability."

He quirked a brow. "It could've been worse."

I mulled over that for a bit and replied, "yeah, I guess it could've. You spared me from watching my daddy and Pam do the dirty with your waitresses."

Eric chuckled, "I moved you before Longshadow's death was final."

"Did he go up in flames or something?" I shivered, would I have been caught in the flames and been burnt to a crisp?

"He..." Eric hesitated, choosing his words carefully. Satisfied, he nodded and continued, "imploded."

That was a mental image I didn't need. Then, I realized something, "what happens to three vampires when a human is covered in dead vampire?"

Eric's expression changed into one of hunger, and it was a ravenous hunger. Unlike the earlier ones I saw on his face where he looked like he wanted to devour me, but in the good way, this hunger was cold and scary, ancient and primal.

I gulped. "Got it." I wondered about Elvira and the others, and felt shame for thinking of their well being only now. "Are your waitresses still alive?"

"Alive, yes."

And that was all he was willing to say.

But I wasn't done.

"Belinda and the bleached blonde sweeping the floors have Swiss cheese for brains. Any more glamouring and I doubt they'd remember their own names." I admonished.

Eric shrugged. "That does not concern me."

Of course it didn't. Vampires were better than us, so who cared if our brains were fried while working for them.

I gritted my teeth, "Well, it should. When they agreed to work for you, they agreed to fulfill their duties as barmaids, be bitten if they were so inclined, and go home in the same condition they went to work in - minus a pint or two of blood. What they didn't agree to, was to have their minds violated night after night to the point where they're one glamour away from staring vacantly at the television with drool hanging out of their mouths."

Eric was suddenly inches from my face. He stared at me and with fire in his eyes and said slowly and icily, "Are you insinuating that glamour is the same as rape?"

I closed the gap. My nose touching his nose, I narrowed my eyes, and spoke one word. "Yes,"

He looked like he didn't know whether to kiss me or kill me. He'd be in for a rude awakening if he tried to kiss me. I was so angry I could spit nails and would've probably bitten his lip off.

I'd never know what he'd have eventually decided on, because at that moment, Pam and Daddy zipped into the bathroom.

"Who am I killing?"

* * *

**A/N: Sorry this one took so long! After two discouraging guest reviews from the previous chapter, I went on a beta hunt. xQueen Nothingx, an extremely busy woman, was brave enough to take on the task of editing my writing. I changed most of the technical stuff she suggested and took her advice on something vampire blood related, but decided to keep their OOC behavior. *shrugs* This isn't canon and I'm not Charlaine; I write them how I want/wish them to be.**

** I apologize if they're not the same Eric/Sookie you fell in love with in the series, but know that my beta already pointed this out - I'm just too mule headed to heed her advice.**

**Anyway, I want to thank xQueen Nothingx for her help and taking time away from her crazy schedule to do this for me/us. Remember folks, none of us are getting paid for this. So, lots of e-cookies and hugs for your hard work QN!**

**As a wonderful reader, uriil, noticed I've started an AH fic called U Remind Me. I'm not sure how the scheduling for NED will be affected down the road, but Chapter 13 has already been completed and will be up in a few days. Hopefully I'll still be able to update twice a week (one update per story) but I have a feeling it might lag into updating each story on alternating weeks. *fingers crossed***

**Thank you for your patience and I hope you stick with me while I try to figure out this mess. Your reviews have kept me going and shaped this story into what it is so please keep them coming!**


	13. Chapter 13

Chapter 13

**EPOV**

I've been in a perpetual state of boredom for the last two centuries or so. It was my reason for turning Pam. I saw her climbing out of her window and was immediately intrigued; women were bound and judged by misogynistic standards in those times, and her actions were untoward a lady of her station. I kept to the shadows and followed Pam to her trysting place. Their meeting was innocent; light kisses and foolish declarations of undying love, but it was enough to have disgraced her. If her midnight rendezvous were to be discovered, and the male did not agree to wed her, no other would have her. She knew this, but still she dared the consequences.

Her audaciousness determined her fate that night. When she tried to move silently through her garden, I showed myself and drained her. After I placed her back in her bed for her family to find, they buried her thinking she'd died from a mysterious ailment. Three nights later, I dug her up so she wouldn't awaken in her coffin, and she's been my most loyal companion since.

Pam's training and tutelage kept me occupied for over a century, but even then, I couldn't escape the all-pervading sense of ennui.

I'd thought the Great Revelation would give me at least a decade of reprieve, but I didn't take into account humanity's obsession with death.

Humans. They were weak, had an unreasonable amount of unwarranted self-importance and greatly overestimated their intelligence and worth. I didn't hate them; that would imply that I cared. I simply endured, night after night to the point where I began regretting my decision to operate a human friendly vampire bar. The vermin, as my child Pam had so accurately dubbed them, reeked of even more desperation than the rest of their tiresome species.

So it was with great relief that I departed for the Stackhouse home some hours after receiving the most peculiar phone call from a woman since the invention of the telephone. She had killed her would be rapist and phoned a vampire establishment seeking aid; it truly was a first for me and I was intrigued enough to seek her out.

My first impression of her was that she was attractive. It wasn't until I appeared at her doorway that I truly appreciated her beauty. Five foot seven or eight, voluptuous curves, hair the same color as mine, eyes a She was, quite simply, radiant. A drop of sunshine after a thousand years of darkness, I was determined to have her. When it became clear that my child had purposely hidden her from me, I began questioning whether this woman was worth the strain in my relationship with Pam when I inevitably tired of her; sunshine and telepath or not, she was just a woman.

That was easier said than done. I'm seldom denied what I want, and when I decided the woman, Sookie was forbidden fruit, it made her all the more appealing. I found myself thinking about her nightly, on my throne and when I partook of the fangbangers. Instead of a sea of desperation and darkness, I saw her golden hair and pink tank top and bed shorts. Blood began to lose its appeal after I compared everything to what I'd imagined her to taste. Fucking became even more of a chore as I struggled to keep her face and body out of my mind. She became a distraction that I didn't need, but found myself welcoming nonetheless.

After two months of the self-induced torture, I realized I was my own worst enemy. It was impossible for any woman to be as mesmerizing as the one in my memories, and therefor, she did not exist; she was simply a figment of my imagination. All I had to do was visit the real Sookie Stackhouse and see once and for all that she was just a beautiful woman, nothing more. I'd fuck her, get her out of my system, then glamour her to forget. Pam would be none the wiser, and her precious Corbett's sensibilities would be spared.

That was the first misstep I'd make.

I was so completely and utterly wrong to underestimate this woman's hold on me that I blurted the first thing on my mind when asked why I was there; I'd tell her in private. As I sat in the depressing excuse of a restaurant and pondered my next step, I decided my original plan to fuck and glamour was still the best option. I knew she was attracted to me, most women were, and I took no small amount of pleasure when I caught her ogling me. When her face flushed, I knew then and there that I'd want her to remember our encounter. It was too rare to elicit that kind of an honest response from a woman, and I looked forward to teasing her every chance I got - Pam and Corbett be damned.

After overhearing that she was untouched, I knew my former decision of allowing her her memories was a sound one. Learning of her ability to withstand glamour didn't alter my plans, but it did make her more interesting and made me wonder, just how much my child keeping from me.

She was cute when she tried to cajole me into teaching her survival tactics in my world but when she spoke of her ability and services in telepathy with such a self deprecating air, I found myself growing more curious and for the first time in my existence, I wanted to know a human. I wanted to know what made that frown appear when I inquired about her decision to waitress in her dilapidated town. I wanted to know why there was an air of sorrow, pain and despair surrounding her even though she radiated beauty, innocence, and life. And most of all, I wanted to know how she sounded when she screamed my name in pleasure.

What changed the outcome of the night was when I found my body moving unconsciously towards her. My hands moved to touch her, my feet took steps towards her. It was constant and it was unacceptable. She was a weakness I could not allow, nor could I afford. And so, I grew angry, with her and with myself, and took off in my Corvett without a backwards glance.

That was last night.

Tonight, I came out of my daytime slumber with a renewed determination to not allow this woman, this twenty-something year old child, toy with me. I would use her to shore up my power base and have an advantage over my enemies, and I would fuck and feed from her if I so pleased.

I barely glanced at her when I arrived at Fangtasia, but it was enough for a vampire to see and remember every detail. She looked delectable in blue and gold; the colors enhanced her delicious tan and emphasized her golden locks. The thought angered me.

My anger escalated to unmitigated rage when Longshadow leered at her like a piece of meat. When he dropped his fangs at her obvious discomfort, I was close to ripping his head off his shoulders. And when he launched himself at her and dared sink his fangs into what was mine, I ended him.

Once again, I found my body reacting unconsciously when it came to this woman and I quickly extricated her from under Longshadow's decaying corpse. I would've relished the sight and pleasures of sharing a woman covered in blood with my child and her progeny, but the thought of taking Sookiein such a brute manner sickened me. I was always possessive, but I never denied Pam her requests to share bed partners; yet, the thought of sharing Sookie with anyone renewed my rage. She was _mine_, whether I accepted that fact or not.

Upon arriving at my nearest safe house, I carried her to my bathroom. Of all the things in relation to this woman and her effect on me, the fact that I allowed her inside my bathroom was the biggest surprise to me. Pam wasn't even allowed use of my rooms. I prepared a separate light tight suite for her in each of my safe houses, but she never shared my bed or bath. Not after we stopped fucking a few years after she discovered the pleasures of the finer sex.

My second misstep was giving her my blood. I almost came undone by the sensation of her lips wrapped around my wrist, sucking deeply, drawing my blood into her body. Knowing a part of me was coursing through her unleashed something primal within me that demanded I take her. When the sweet scent of her arousal drifted into my nose, it took every ounce of my will to control my desire to part her legs, wrap them around my head and taste her.

When she closed her eyes, I couldn't help myself and brushed my lips quickly against hers. I wanted more than the stolen kiss, so when she stunned me with her declaration of trust, I kissed the foolish woman and only stopped when I felt her pain.

The night ended sourly when she overstepped her boundaries and thought to tell me how to run my business. I was annoyed and quickly dismissed her unwarranted concerns. In her anger, she was quick to paint me as a monster and failed to learn and understand that when I said Ginger and Belinda's over glamoured states were of no concern to me, it was because I didn't oversee personnel, and also because the women were Longshadow's pets. Human problems were low on my list of concerns, this is true, but they were under _my_ employ and thus, I had an obligation to their well being. It's why I supplied them with health insurance and paid overtime, for fucks sake.

I didn't know whether to fuck her or kill her when she heatedly equated glamour with rape. After centuries with Ocella as a maker, even if one had the previous inclination, which I never had, for forced sexual acts, one quickly loses the appetite it. Her insinuation was both offensive and hypocritical because she seemed to have forgotten her assault on the shifter was due his accusation of the very thing she accused me of. Even knowing she behaved the way she did due to her physical and emotional state; adrenaline and hormonal levels spiking in her body after her instincts to fight or flight ran its course, it only sought to remind me of how fickle and weak humans were.

And thus began my third and final misstep taken against the woman.

"Who am I killing?" My child always had a flair for the dramatics but I was ashamed to admit her question wasn't entirely off base.

"Why are you here?" I glanced at Corbett, "Why are you _both_ here?"

The bane of my existence looked at me accusingly and shrugged. "Thought this was a party, my baby girl being here and all." Then he added in almost an afterthought, "Thalia's watching the bar."

I ran a hand over my face and tried to quell the desire to pull my hair out. "You thought leaving a bar full of excited humans in _Thalia's _care was a good idea?" I would've preferred Ginger, idiot that she was, over the homicidal vampire.

Pam grinned. "She hasn't broken any bones all week. I thought it'd be a good reward and a show of good faith."

She'll see it as a punishment, that I had no doubt. However, she did need the test; I had to know I could trust her to run things in my absence. If this proved too much for her limitations, I would need to send for Chow to manage Fangtasia during the unlikely event of Pam, myself, and Corbett being otherwise occupied.

Sookie, sitting pensively through all this, suddenly raised her hand. Three heads swung her way.

She cleared her throat and said, "First, I just wanna say how sorry I am for causing the mess I did. If I waited to tell y'all in private about what I saw instead of raising the alarm, y'all wouldn't be short a business partner and owe restitution."

I glared at the two idiots of my blood. Just how much of our ways did they reveal to her?

"Second, I'm really grateful to you, Eric, for... Well, for everything you've done for me tonight and everything you've _ever _done for my family. Please don't think I'm ungrateful just because I tend to run my mouth when I'm nervous or uncomfortable."

I nodded, it was true. Her family was in my debt, especially for putting up with Corbett's insolence. But I placed that blame solely on my child; she gave him too long a leash for someone so young.

"That leads me to my third point, which is how sorry I am for saying those horrible things to you and for being the world's biggest hypocrite. I know glamour isn't the same as-" her cheeks flushed at how embarrassed she was by her own words, "rape. I feel like one of those bigoted assholes at my old job just repeating it."

I acquiesced to her apology. I already knew she didn't mean her earlier words, it was what she did mean that annoyed me. The sheer fact that she had the audacity to tell me what to do was baffling; humans were too meek to voice their opinions nonetheless demand I change my practices to suit their sensibilities. It was suicidal. And so I waited for the next part of her apology; for not heeling and for over stepping her bounds.

It never came.

"Daddy, I know I should've told you sooner but with everything that happened tonight, I never got the chance."

Corbett looked curious as he replied, "What is it?"

"Remember how Hadley got married and had a kid?"

He nodded slowly, "Yeah... "

"Well, she upped and left about half a year ago."

He huffed, "That girl has all of her momma's looks but none of her heart."

"Remy, that's her husband, showed up at our house today with their son, Hunter." She hesitated and chewed her lower lip. I was amazed by how much I still wanted to kiss them. "Hunter, he's uh..." She glanced at Pam and me, "He's living with us now."

Corbett stared at his daughter for a beat before nodding, "Yeah, yeah. So few of us left, oughta take care of our own. Let me know what y'all need, I'll get everything together by tomorrow night."

"I'm not sure yet. Remy's supposed to bring Hunter's things over tomorrow morning."

Pam rummaged through her oversized handbag for a pen and paper. She scribbled something on a dollar bill and handed it to Sookie. "Call Bobby Burnham with a list of things you'll need. He'll have it delivered by the end of the day."

Sookie took the note and asked, "Burnham? Wasn't that the name of the guy y'all were looking for two years ago?"

Yes, and they killed him for embezzling.

Corbett gave her a sheepish grin, "This is the son."

Because Pam's evil streak mandated abusing the fuck out of his descendants and hiring Bobby as my day man. He was another reason for my distaste for the human species; his self inflated ego, desperation for approval, and overestimation of worth and intelligence was only made tolerable by the "errands" Pam sent him on. My favorite was when he donned rainbow attire and attended a Tea Party rally; he made the news for starting a nationwide movement. Bobby didn't fare so well when Pam had him wear nothing but adult diapers and a belt made of mutilated dolls to attend the pro choice march in DC.

"Delicious as you smell covered in dried blood, you look like absolute shit. Why haven't you cleaned yourself yet?" Pam asked.

Sookie blushed a spectacular shade of pink and replied, "Hadn't gotten around to it yet."

Because we were preoccupied with other matters. Such as taste testing how my blood tasted on her tongue.

"Because you were busy _not_ fucking my maker."

Corbett growled.

"What, it's true! Their clothes are still on and the room only smells of her arous-"

Corbett slapped a hand over her mouth. "Woman, I do _not _need to hear about my baby girl's se..se.." He floundered. It was cute.

Oh, this was turning out to be a good night after all.

"Your daughter's _sex_ life." I offered helpfully, with a leer in Sookie's direction.

She looked like she'd rather be under Longshadow's decaying corpse than here.

"Yes, thank you, Captain Obvious." He gestured towards his daughter, "Tell us what you got from Belinda's head, then Pam'll get you something to change into so you can shower and come home with us."

My original intention of leaving Sookie, and her suicidal tendency to speak out of turn and demand things she had no right to from me, alone was quickly abandoned. Nothing was more delicious than a bite into the forbidden artery.

"That won't be necessary. Sookie and I have unfinished business to attend to."

"Over my dead body!"

With a blink, I was directly in front of him. Looming over him, I spoke quietly and enunciated slowly, "You forget your place, Stackhouse."

He took a step back but shook his head. "Look, when it comes to political shit and everything else, I'll defer to you like a good lil baby vamp. But when it comes to my kid, you don't get to pull rank because I'm her goddamn father and I... I changed her diapers!"

The buffoon was serious. Only years of controlling my expression hid my mirth.

Pam, through our bond, of course knew otherwise. "Oh, I don't know, Corbett... Your baby girl and your grand pappy? Isn't that the norm in Bumfuck, Louisiana; population three hundred; two hundred and fifty of which are sister-cousins?"

It was times like these that made me appreciate my child's twisted sense of humor. She truly was worth all the years of frustration she caused me as a fledgling.

Sookie groaned. "Not that it's any of your-" she looked pointedly at her father and Pam, "business who I'm seeing, sexually or not, Eric and I are just friends. If we do decide to take things to the next level, it will be because we're both consensual adults. Eric, fifty times over, but that's a whole 'nother can of worms that's nunya business either."

Corbett opened his mouth, in protest no doubt, but his daughter held her hand out to stop whatever nonsense he was about to spew.

"I don't really talk about my disability with anyone, not since Daddy left, so putting what I do instinctively now into words is kinda weird, but I'll try my best." Hands smoothing over the hem of her dress repeatedly, she cleared her throat and raised her head up high. "I used to hear peoples's thoughts. I mean I still do, but ever since I started poking around in their thoughts, I found out I could dig through their memories if I directed them to what I wanted to know. With the memory thing came the mental pictures of what they were remembering. I keep my shields, the mental walls Daddy helped me build to keep the voices from overwhelming me when I was little, down most of the time now. It started after Pam scared the ever loving shit out of me as a child, but continued well into my teenage years to stay a step ahead of Michelle. The only time my shields are ever up are when I'm with Gran, but even then I don't lock my mind up completely - that's how I was able to hear her screaming in my sleep when she was being strangled by Rene.

"When my shields are down and I'm not focused on anyone in particular's mind, thoughts just sorta become a background buzz. Like the sound a refrigerator makes when it's real quiet. Every now and then, a keyword I'll hear would jump out at me - a name, a phrase, anything that would pique my interest - and I'll focus to locate where it came from."

Her ability worked similarly as vampiric hearing. Having highly advanced auditory senses and thus being able to distinguish every nuance in sound and hear even the lightest whispered conversations in a room, vampires have had to find ways to cope with the sensory overload otherwise we'd all have succumbed to madness by our first month. "Background buzz" was a fitting description to the constant influx of noise, and we shared the ability to cipher chaos into useful information through the use of "keywords".

I knew vampires who were overwhelmed by their new state of hearing, so for a human - and she must've been a child no less - to not have only overcome, but to have mastered it as well, was more than impressive. Sookie Stackhouse was full of surprises, a rarity in a breather, and I found myself wondering just what else she was capable of.

She'd excell at being a vampire.

That thought caught me off guard. I hadn't found a human worth siring since Pam. But the more I thought about it the more I realized that no, I didn't want to be Sookie's progenitor; children never stayed with their makers for long.

Then, what _did_ I want?

The question baffled me. Did I want another companion? I had Pam, and much to my rancor, Corbett as well. Did I want a pet? Just the thought of a vacuous, desperate, depressing puppet of a woman catering to my every whim was enough to disgust me - so no, I didn't want a pet. Did I want an equal? I thought back to our previous conversation and the issue that roused her ire and irritated me so; she demanded better treatment of the blood bags in my employ and I was annoyed at the fact that a breather was demanding anything from me at all. Was it irritation? I analyzed my feelings, or what the little I retained from my humanity was called.

Yes, it was irritation - but irritation brought on by a feeling of... Unease. Why? Why did this woman's boldness make me uneasy?

I studied her. She was beautiful, that was an undeniable fact, but I'd met greater beauties in my millennia. She had the fae allure, yes, but I've fucked and fed from purer bloods than she and, other than reminiscing the taste of their blood when I suffered through periods of drought, I hadn't thought of them since. This woman, however, plagued my thoughts; and no woman, alive or dead, had elicited this kind of response from me. How did her ability to glamour me, and that's exactly what she'd done to me, relate to my feelings of unease? I pondered that for a stretch of time and came up with only one answer.

I was... afraid - I tested that word in my mind, I hadn't felt fear in, unwisely, far too long and had become unfamiliar with it - to want her. I knew the facts; she was quick witted, wielded more power with her mind than she ever knew possible, was certainly brave when it came to defending those she loved, and was pragmatic enough to not romanticize me - as evident in her conversation with the fangbanger at Merlotte's. She also had a deliciously voluptuous body and radiated light and life.

So why the fuck would I fear her?

She looked up at Pam, "That's how I knew the Rattrays were drainers, by the way. And you're welcome."

Pam's fangs dropped, and she grinned viciously at the memory of that errand. She had fun with the inbred morons for over a week in the Dungeon - Corbett's term for Fangtasia's cellar - before eventually draining the drainers. It was quite fitting, really; Hammurabi was right.

Sookie shuddered, "After reading the women who y'all allow over at your house, I learned pretty quickly how to tell when someone's been glamoured." She began smoothing over the hem of her dress again, and looked at us with something close to terror in her eyes. "I've never done this before, I swear. Hell, I don't even know _how_ I did it but somehow I managed to, to _un_glamour Belinda."

I was wrong. She wielded more power in that beautiful mind of hers than even _I _thought possible.

I straightened from my casual position against the glass wall. "This does not leave the room."

Corbett nodded, but surprisingly, it was Pam who appeared relieved by the inference of my protection.

"Sookie, does Belinda realize what you did?" I asked.

"No, I mean I don't think so. I guess unglamour isn't really the right word since I didn't restore her memory. I um-" she looked at me sheepishly, "I kinda stole it from her completely."

"Can't steal something that's already gone, baby girl."

Even a broken clock was right twice a day.

"Daddy, you don't understand," she looked at Corbett pleadingly, "Glamouring leaves holes in a person's memories but there's still a shadow, a hint of _something, _a residue or whatever it is that's left behind. What I did scrubbed that hole clean and left _nothing_ in its place. No remnant of what should've been there at all. That's how I knew she was skimming money from the tip jar. Longshadow found out what she was doing and made her split her take and taught her to how to falsify the bar and gift shop's inventory. But instead of just seeing it through her memories, _I _was there. _I _was the one that stole and _I _was the one he, he-" she looked sick, "used and fed from."

I felt an irrational wave of possessiveness and anger but ignored it. "I wonder," I mused aloud, "if that was why your nose bled. The transference of her erased memories must have had an adverse effect on your mind."

We were all thoughtful for a moment then, Corbett broke the silence.

"Useful and fucking amazing as it is what you can do now, baby girl, until we know what it did to your brain, you shouldn't do it again."

Sookie nodded but asked, "How would I know what it did to me? It's not like I can get a CAT scan while doing whatever I did at the same time."

"Oh, but you can." Pam said.

"And risk doctors or the government finding out about my disability? No thanks, I'd rather not get kidnapped in the middle of the night by men in black suits and wake up in Roswell."

"You watch too much television." Pam said, shaking her head.

"Oh, that's rich coming from the vampire who wanted to drain the entire cast of America's Next Top Model."

"Threatened. I threatened to drain them!"

Sookie sniggered, "Sure, whatever you say."

Pam's eyes sparkled with mischief, "Since I'm your boss now that you work at Fangtasia, I think I'm going to have to insist on enforcing a rule on uniforms."

"Actually, and I really hate to burst your bubble, but _Eric's_ my boss. I don't work for Fangtasia, I work strictly for Eric as his financial consultant."

Pam pouted. "Fine, but you'll still have to wear a uniform."

"Nope,"

"Eric will give you a clothing allowance if you do."

"She'll be getting one regardless." I interjected before the conversation grew even more irksome. I had other pressing matters to attend to. I straightened, "Your presences are no longer needed here. Leave."

Sookie moved to stand.

"Not you. You will stay."

Her head snapped up and fire ignited in her eyes, "I'll do whatever the hell I damn well please, thank you very much, and no man - vampire or not - is going to stop me."

My cock twitched.

She stomped over to the glass doorway, "Now if you'll excuse me, I have to get home."

Never one to force a woman against her will, I lowered my head to hers and whispered against her ear, "This is not over."

Her cheeks flushed deliciously pink, "No, it isn't," she conceded. Then she placed a chaste kiss on my cheek, - which her father protested vocally with another growl - and said, "I'll see you tomorrow night, Eric."

* * *

**A/N: thank you guys, so much, for all your kind words and support last chapter. I know the endgame of this story; the journey getting there seems unclear but that's what makes this fun for me :]**

**this chapter was unbeta'd so any faults you found are all mine.**


	14. Chapter 14

Chapter 14

**SPOV**

It was almost dark out when I _heard_ the day man. He was driving and about to round the corner at the Compton property and was headed straight for Gran's. I looked down at Hunter whose mouth was covered in chocolate frosting from the cake we baked together and smiled.

"Let's get cleaned up, buddy. Mr. Burnham's almost here with your new things. Then I have to leave for work."

He looked up at me, eyes wide as saucers, and exclaimed, "Wow! You can hea wewwy faw!"

"You will too if you keep practicing like I taught you." I said, carefully picking him up so I wouldn't get any chocolate on my clothes and walked over to the sink.

I had on a pair of black slacks, a white button down shirt and was wearing my only pair of black pumps. My outfit was completely different from yesterday's pretty dress, carefully matched accessories and up do, but I ran out of appropriate dresses. Also, I figured since I _was_ officially Eric's financial consultant, I might as well look the part.

The knock on the front door sounded just as we finished.

"Can I help you?" I heard Gran ask.

_B: Why am I talking to Betty White? I want to see the slut my Masters are fucking._

"I have a delivery for Sookie Stackhouse."

_S:_ _Hunter, I'm going to need you to raise your shields like I taught you._

"Coming!" I said, placing Hunter on my hip and speed walking to the door.

_B: Oh, I bet you will be, sugar tits. God, those are some Class A tits. I wonder if the Masters will share her if I ask nicely._

"Sookie Stackhouse?" The pig asked.

"Yes," I replied, readjusting Hunter so he was covering my chest.

_H: Why, Aunt Sookie?_

_S: Because Mr. Burnham's thoughts are vile and inappropriate._

"We spoke earlier. I'm Bobby, here with your orders."

_B: She needs to put the little shit down. I see fuck all with him in the way. I wonder who she fucks first. Maybe they all fuck her at the same time._

_S: Now, Hunter!_

I heard the door to his little mind slam shut.

"I know. Just bring everything inside." I ordered testily.

Gran looked fit to be tied but I squeezed her hand gently and shook my head. Understanding immediately dawned in her eyes and she turned to stare angrily at Bobby.

_Fucking trailer trash slut, ordering me around. Who the fuck does she think she is? Fang banging whore needs to keep her trap shut and legs open. Alls she good for._

I gritted my teeth and waited for him to be out of hearing range before telling Gran, "His thoughts are so nasty I could puke!"

"Why don't you head to work now, dear. I'll tell him where everything belongs."

Daddy and Pam were less than a twenty minute drive away and less than half of that if they ran over. Their blood was also still in her system so they'd be able to detect if anything was wrong.

I looked at my watch. Bobby took longer than expected and I was running behind schedule after waiting for his arrival. "I need to get going anyway. Call me if you need me."

Gran patted my hand, "Don't you worry about me. Have a great night at work, sweet heart."

I placed Hunter down on the sofa, gave him a kiss on his head and ran into my room. After quickly running a brush through my hair, I grabbed my black purse and hurried out the kitchen door.

The drive to Shreveport was uneventful and before I knew it, I was pulling into Fangtasia's parking lot. I scanned the lot for hidden danger before unlocking my car and heading inside the bar.

The same group of girls from yesterday were here today and other than slight variations in their outfits, they looked pretty much the same; big hair, low necklines, lots of leg and sky high heels,

I spotted Belinda sitting on a stool doing nothing again and dipped into her head as I made my way over to her.

"Hey, Belinda."

_Do I know her?_

"How do you know my name?" She barked.

I checked the other women's minds but no one seemed to remember seeing me last night. I guessed the vampires glamoured them to forget what happened.

I gave her what I hoped was a genuine smile and said, "I'm Mr. Northman's financial consultant and will be observing the going ons at Fangtasia for the foreseeable future."

_Why is she telling me this?_

"What do you want?"

Another waitress, Ginger, looked up from sweeping and said, "Don't mind her. If you need help with anything or got any questions, just ask me. I been working here the longest and don't mind helping none."

"Thanks Ginger, I'll be sure to keep that in mind."

I mulled around for a bit and eventually ended up at the bar, washing the glasses and wiping the counter top. The girls didn't seem to be bothered by me intruding on their territory and in fact seemed glad that they had an extra hand. Belinda, on the other hand, was worried that I'd be waitressing later and splitting their tips.

I was in the middle of cutting garnishes when the vampires arrived. Daddy and Eric wore jeans and tees while Pam was dressed to the nines in a pretty black lace gown with a bustier top. Her hair was swept up in an elaborate up do, and her lips and nails were an eye catching blood red that emphasized her milky white skin.

Like the previous night, I greeted everyone with a nod. Unlike the previous night, Eric's eyes actually warmed upon seeing me before he gestured for us to follow him to his office. Daddy zipped over to give me a kiss on the top of my head and walked with me down the hall to the office.

I looked around for signs of a dead Long Shadow but saw nothing with my untrained eye. Unsure of where to sit, and frankly not wanting to after what I gleamed from Dawn's memories, I leaned against the door and crossed my feet at the ankles.

Pam, who was standing by the desk, gave me a once over and shook her head in disappointment.

"I tell you you have a clothing stipend and this is the best you can do? Sookie, Sookie, Sookie... Have you learned _nothing_ from our years together?" She tsked.

I managed to stop an eye roll and replied, "I'm sorry, Pam. Next time I'll be sure to remember that dressing to please Pamela is higher priority than helping a two year old get settled in."

She nodded her approval. "I'm glad you see the error of your ways."

"Bobby brought everything over?" Daddy, sitting on the couch, looked up at me and asked.

I crossed my arms against my chest and huffed, "No clue, I didn't hang around long enough to find out."

"What'd he do?"

"He didn't _do _anything. It's the nasty things he was thinking that made me get out of Dodge ASAP."

"About you?"

"Me, y'all, him, all of us." I looked at Pam and asked, "Can glamour make someone less of a dick?"

An evil glint lit her eyes as she replied, "No, but I can glamour away the use of his dick."

I shook my head. "I don't see how that'll keep him from thinking inappropriate things around a telepath."

Eric, busy tapping away on his computer, offered, "Your father will glamour him to see the woman he respects most in his life instead of you." He then looked up at me, "The boy who now lives with you, you are fond of him, yes?"

I nodded.

"Then I advise you to make his father surrender his parental rights. Humans are... fickle. It would not be out of the realm of possibilities for him to try and reclaim the boy at a later date."

My eyes widened. I never even thought of that. "How do I do that?"

"A lawyer will contact you tomorrow with details." Eric replied, then turned his attention back to his computer.

"Thanks, Eric." I said gratefully.

He nodded, completely absorbed by whatever he was doing.

"How's Hunter settling in?" Daddy asked.

"So far so good. He's a great kid. And so smart too." I had a lot more I wanted to tell him, such as how I taught Hunter how to build a shield around his mind that Daddy taught me to build when I was a little girl and how quick he took to learning how to use it. But I couldn't. The knowledge of Hunter's disability was his to share, not mine. "When are you leaving?"

Daddy glanced at Eric who was still buried in his work and replied, "Soon, I wanna make sure you'll be alright before I take off with Pam."

I waved my hand dismissively, "Don't worry about me, I'll be fine. You should really get going, it's getting late and almost his bedtime."

Daddy cast one last glance at Eric then got up, caught Pam's hand in his and walked over to the door. I moved out of the way, reassured him again that I was going to be fine without him, and watched them leave.

After five minutes of standing around and unsure of what to do now since Eric was still attached to his computer, I turned to leave when he ordered, "Stay."

Eyes narrowed, lips pursed, I quickly turned to glare at him. "You did _not _just ord-"

My words were cut off when his hand suddenly covered my mouth.

Head bent so we were at eye level, his blue eyes locked on mine as he murmured, "Wait," then zipped back to his seat, fixed his hair and resumed his work.

Next thing I knew, the door was shoved open behind my back, knocking me forward a few steps. Daddy and Pam zipped inside, Daddy with concern and suspicion on his face while Pam's looked positively gleeful. They took one look at Eric, who was still typing away unperturbed on his computer, and me, who they obviously dislodged from my position against the door, and the expressions on their faces swapped; Daddy's turned gleeful while Pam's became suspicious.

"What the hell?!" I yowled, rubbing my back.

"Forgot to kiss my baby girl goodbye." Daddy lied, then bent to do just that.

Pam's gaze swiveled back and forth between me and her maker then, scowling, she took Daddy's proffered hand and they zipped away again.

Combined, those two were over two hundred years old but they sure as hell didn't act like it. Lesson learned, I stepped far, far away from the door and walked over to examine the contents of Eric's bookshelf.

Head to the side reading the spine of a book, I was down on my haunches and completely focused in my task of deciphering Eric's reading habits when I found myself suddenly airborne.

I yelped and threw my arms around the nearest thing, which incidentally was Eric's neck.

"What are you doing?" I asked, unnecessarily since it became obvious when a mischievous smirk appeared on his face right before he leaned in and kissed me.

My arms tightened around his neck as my lips responded to his on them. Like last night, Eric spared no mercy and kissed me demandingly. I found my back against the door again as he spread my legs and wrapped them around his waist. My breath hitched at how good it felt to feel him against me, and my panties dampened. His fangs clicked into place and my pulse quickened.

God, it was so sexy to know I could elicit that kind of response from his body.

One hand under my ass, the other cupping my face, he ground into me. I gasped and his tongue swept into my mouth, exploring its depths. Tentatively, I touched my tongue to his and he slowed to match my pace. His soft lips lessened their pressure against mine and he allowed me to take the lead. My tongue flicked against his then slipped out to lick his lips. I sucked on his lower lip roughly and he gave my ass a firm squeeze. My tongue slipped back inside his mouth and licked the tips of his fangs. He growled. I felt it vibrate against my core and whimpered. His demanding nature took over and our movements grew frenzy. I sucked on his tongue as he ground himself harder against me and we both moaned.

My heart was beating a staccato rhythm, I wanted more. Eric seemed to be on the same page because he ripped open my shirt, buttons flying everywhere, and trailed kisses down my neck, across my collarbone, and on the swells of my breasts.

He groaned and turned to walk us over to his desk. Mouth sucking on a particularly sensitive spot on the side of my neck, he lowered my back onto his desk. My legs still locked above his hips, he ground into me, pushing my body against the desk.

Something about this stuck me as wrong, but too caught up in a sexual high, I ignored it and enjoyed the feel of his length against my hot core.

Eric flicked his tongue against the thin lace covering each of my nipples and pulled my bra straps down. He lowered the lace cups and lifted his head to look at my uncovered breasts.

"Perfect," he murmured.

He lowered his head to my breast, wrapped his soft lips around my nipple and sucked hard. I felt his fangs scrape against my flesh and moaned.

"Eric," I breathed; back arching, head thrown back in ecstasy.

He ground against me, pushing me higher on the desk and again, my mind protested the move.

It finally hit me why when my flaying arms knocked something glass onto the floor, shattering it.

Unlocking my legs from his waist, I placed my hands against his chest and pushed.

Too lost in his lust fueled haze, Eric didn't even notice and continued to lavish attention on my breasts.

"Eric," I said, shoving his chest hard now.

"Hmm?" He hummed, mouth full of breast, the sound vibrating down to my core.

I shivered and had to shake my head to regain focus.

"Get up," I said, holding his head still with both hands.

"Mm... Why?" His questioning blue eyes looking up at me.

"Because I want you to stop."

That got his attention.

He pushed himself up and gazed down at me with heat in his eyes. "Lover, you look delicious sprawled across my desk like a virgin offering."

Ignoring the presumptuous nickname, I quickly climbed off the desk and began fumbling with my bra. Eric, instead of helping, ran a finger down my side, brushing against the curve of my breast. I gently slapped his hand away and slipped my arms through the straps.

God, I was such an idiot! I almost had sex with a guy on his desk that he'd fucked plenty of other women on. I wasn't upset with him; he never presented himself as something other than what he was. I was upset with myself, for allowing myself to be just like the others; just another face, just another body, just another name. I wanted - no, I _deserved_ better than that.

I held my shirt closed and turned to face him. Nibbling my bottom lip, I started to ask if he had a shirt I could borrow, then hesitated because I realized said shirt would've been left behind by one of his previous conquests. Remembering he had a gift shop, I walked over to my purse and pulled out a twenty dollar bill.

"Eric, can I buy a Fangtasia shirt from your store?"

His eyes danced in amusement. "Why do you need my permission?"

My face flushed and I looked down at my shoes. "I uh.. I'd appreciate it if you got it for me. I'd rather not have the other employees see me like this."

He straightened from his perch against his desk and pulled my hands down from their steely grip on my shirt. Hands pushing apart the shirt, he ran his fingers down the sides of my body - traveling slowly from my breasts, to my ribs, down to my waist, and finally to the flare of my hips.

He yanked my hips forward and my body fell into his. "I let my desires get the best of me," he paused to lift my chin up. Eyes searching mine for something, I didn't know what, he continued, "When I take you as my lover, it will be in my bed. You deserve more than a quick and easy romp in my office."

My heart sighed. He understood. I swallowed and looked down, afraid to let him see the relief, gratification and something else in my eyes.

Eric dipped his head and placed a soft kiss on the corner of my mouth.

"I'll be back." He murmured against my lips, and disappeared.

He returned just as quickly with a women's black Fangtasia tee and helped me put it on after he happily removed my dress shirt.

Grabbing a notepad and pen from his desk, he handed them to me, said, "Write down what you hear," and opened the door.

He strolled past his adoring customers and onto the dais where he sat on a huge throne befitting a king. It was showy and over the top but the masses loved it judging by their cheers and squeals. Ignoring them all, I scooted into an empty booth and began sifting through everyone's thoughts.

Lust.

Envy.

Gluttony.

Sex.

Sex.

Sex.

It was like a roll call for the deadly sins.

One fang banger crawled onto the dais, licked Eric's boot then quickly scampered away.

I wanted to barf.

Other than the people having sex in the bathrooms and the vampires feeding on them, nothing happened for over half an hour.

Then, I heard it.

My head jerked up to look at Eric. His eyes were already on mine and looked at me questioningly. I looked at the notepad and quickly jotted down what I heard.

This was bad. Real bad. I had no illusions that if the knowledge of what I'd heard got out, I'd be a dead woman walking.

I looked back at Eric, my eyes begging, pleading with him to either come over or summon me to his office. I knew he wouldn't turn me away if I went up to him but I wasn't suicidal. I knew doing so would draw unwanted attention to myself when I, more than anything else, needed to stay invisible and under the Queen and other vampire's radar.

Eric stood and gestured for a tiny female vampire to take his spot on the throne. She did not look pleased. Then he made his way back to his office.

I waited five minutes, scribbling something else I'd heard, and tried not to appear too anxious as I made my way past several vampires and down the hall to Eric's office.

My heart was pounding by the time his door closed behind me.

"Can anyone hear us?" I whispered.

Eric got up from behind his desk, locked the door, then strode over to his stereo and turned the music on loudly. I belatedly recalled thinking that Pam was right; he did listen to rap music because Jay-Z was telling me that "ladies is pimps too" and that I should go and brush my shoulder off. I had no fucking idea what that meant but I suddenly had this insane urge to toss some salt over my shoulder and do as he said.

Taking my hand, Eric led me to the couch and pulled me down onto his lap.

"What did you hear?" He murmured against my ear.

Instead of answering him, I picked up the notebook and handed it to him.

I knew what it said.

That some of his vampires were having sex in the bathroom stalls with his customers. That most, if not all, of his customers imagined either having sex with him or someone else having sex with him. That more than five of his regulars were unhealthily attracted to him. That more than a dozen of them tried stalking him to find his resting place. That Belinda was considering skimming from the cash register again.

And I knew, from the way his eyes shot up to stare at me, that he now knew that I heard a vampire's thoughts.

And I also knew, from the way his arms tightened slightly around my hips, that he now knew that the vampire I'd _heard_ was sent from the Queen to procure me.

* * *

**A/N: did I just write what you think I did?**

***ducks and hides behind the Viking***

**E: The fish knows what it's doing, leave it alone. You will enjoy what she has planned for the procurer.**

**what? You don't believe him?!**

***pokes big bad vamp* **

**psst, down here, big guy! She says she doesn't believe you!**

**E: *flashes you panty melting smirk* The fish will write it, and you will enjoy it. Why? Because how else will you see my Gracious Plenty in this fic? *wags eyebrows***


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